981 



plant with us. Extremely common about Ryde, in Quarr Copse, St. 

 John's, Apley, and in almost every other wood and patch of copse in 

 the neighbourhood. Abundant in the Chine and elsewhere about 

 Shanklin, at Appuldurcombe, and profusely in several parts of Apse 

 Castle, in the dry heathy ground by America, and other spots of that 

 romantic locality. Common about Cowes, in Mrs. Goodwin's grounds, 

 in woods at Osborne, Norris Castle, &c. About Newport, in Little 

 Standen Wood, &c. Abundant in Bordwood Copse, the Parsonage 

 Lynch, and various other places about Newchurch. In the Under- 

 cliff, at Steephill, near Swainston, and in innumerable other places in 

 the island, preferring a dry, friable, light soil, but often, as about 

 Ryde, on stiff clay, or rather perhaps on the vegetable mould that lies 

 upon it ; it also grows on the chalk, but less commonly. I have not 

 specially observed the distribution of L. Forsteri on the mainland, but 

 am convinced it is not uncommon there. In a beech-hanger near 

 Alton. Hedge-bank a little way out of Bishop's Waltham, towards 

 Droxford. Abundant in a wood by the Newbury road from Andover, 

 about a mile beyond Enham. Parnholt or Parnell Wood, near Win- 

 ton. Copse near Whitedell, Mr. W. L. Notcutt. New Forest, Chas. 

 Lyell, Esq., in Hook, and Graves's Contin. of Fl. Lond. Doubtless 

 in many other places, but being, like the rest of the genus, a very 

 early plant, after the flowers and fruit have disappeared in May or 

 June, the species cannot, with that certainty required in giving loca- 

 lities, be distinguished by the foliage alone from some narrow-leaved 

 states of L. pilosa, and hence is often overlooked for that species. 



A doubt, I believe, exists in the minds of some British botanists 

 who have not seen L. Forsteri in a fresh state, but only in the herba- 

 rium, as to its distinctness from L. pilosa ; no one, however, to whom 

 the plant is familiar in its native woods can, I think, reasonably en- 

 tertain such an idea. Strong as is its general resemblance to L. pilosa, 

 and which, when in the dried state and not in seed, may induce a 

 suspicion of its being but a form of that species, there can never be 

 the least difficulty in distinguishing L. Forsteri by its seed and 

 capsules from that or any other species of the genus. There is a 

 remarkable conformity in the aspect of the leaves amongst various 

 unquestionably distinct species of Luzula, and the form of the peri- 

 anth, and even the disposition of the panicle, afford characters little 

 apparent or subject to modification ; such, too, from my own experi- 

 ence, is the relative proportion in length between the anther and its 

 filament, which is yet so far constant as to furnish a very fair subor- 



