1020 



with in Hants. This latter form runs some risk of being mistaken for 

 the following. 



Rhynchospora fusca. In similar places with the last, but much 

 more rarely, and probably confined to the western side of the county. 

 Not seen in the Isle of Wight. Bog by, and to the west of, the rail- 

 way at Christchurch station, on the north side of the railway, where 

 the stream passes under it ; and in the bogs near the railway east of 

 the station, Mr. Borrer !!! Plentifully in a bog between Southampton 

 and Lymington, Petiver, apud Ray's Syn. p. 427. A rare and interest- 

 ing species, well characteristic of the transition so often before noticed 

 in our county flora from the eastern to the western type. 



W. A. Bromfield. 

 Eastmqpnt, Ryde, Isle of Wight. 



(To be contiuued). 



Botanical Society of London. 



Friday, August 2, 1850. John Reynolds, Esq., Treasurer, in the 

 chair. 



A paper was read by Dr. Arthur Hassall " On the Adulteration of 

 Coffee." The author commenced by observing that the inquiries, the 

 results of which he was about to detail, originated in a remark made 

 in the House of Commons during the late debate on chicory, to the 

 effect that no means had been yet discovered by which the adultera- 

 tion of coffee with that substance could be determined. The recol- 

 lection of the fact, that in vegetable charcoal the component parts of 

 the several tissues may be detected by the microscope, led Dr. Has- 

 sall to infer that by the same means the less completely charred cells 

 and vessels, &c, forming the tissues of those substances employed in 

 the adulteration of coffee, might likewise be discovered; an expectation 

 fully realized. In this way it was ascertained that the substances most 

 frequently used in the adulteration of coffee are chicory, roasted wheat, 

 colouring matter, and occasionally beans and potato-flour. The struc- 

 ture of the coffee-berry, and of the several productions just named, were 

 then minutely described ; and it was shown that chicory might at all 



