1861.] KENTISH BOTANV. 213 



the Yellow Flag^ the Bulrush, the Marestail, and the great 

 Water Dock, now fill up the narrow space where kings con- 

 tended, not for glory, but for spoil, like the ancient Greeks. Sic 

 transit gloria mundi. Here we were not unobservant of prepara- 

 tions for a warlike struggle, which we hope will never come : but 

 this is not the place for such inferences or anticipations.^ 



On our way along the sandhills from Sandown Castle to Deal, 

 we collected here and there the following plants, viz. — Allium 

 vineale, Carduus ienuiflorus, Sclerochloe distans ; S. maritima, 

 long past flowering; Scabiosa Columbaria, a considerable distance 

 from the chalk; Chenopodium olidum, near Deal; Polygala 

 depressa, Wend. ; Juncus coenosus, perhaps Car ex l(jevigata, and 

 Hippophae rhamnoides in fruit. 



This we fancied might be the rare plant which our wortlw 

 (jocular?) host at Sandwich foretold that we might find if we 

 had any luck ; or if we were as lucky as a party of fifty botanists, 

 who were at his house some twelve months ago, were. He very 

 modestly told us that he was no botanist, and therefore could 

 neither tell us the name of the plant nor give a very characteristic 

 description of it ; but he said it was a shrub, and grew on the 

 sandhills, and produced a poisonous berry ; also that a single leaf 

 of the plant, if infused in a gallon of water, would render the 

 infusion so poisonous, that a small portion would render our 

 deadliest foes perfectly innocuous. This reminded us of Hector 

 Boece's story of the Scottish king Duncan Macbeth, and Sweno, 

 the leader of the Northmen. It is alleged by the historian that 

 the latter chief and his army were drugged and hocussed with a 

 decoction of Atropa Belladonna, which the Scots administered in 

 ale and wine. There is probably quite as much truth in this 

 story (see ' Gentleman's Magazine ' for July, 1859) as there is in 

 that of our host of the ' Bell ' in Sandwich. 



* The indvilgence of solemn reflections on the alteced state of Sandwich haven, 

 and on the contrast between the past and present condition of the kingdom, woidd 

 not make our readers much wiser. They are too much engaged with the realities 

 of active life, to have much sympathy either with the reminiscences of the past or 

 with anxious forebodings about the future. 



We were well satisfied with what we saw, and wish our readers may have as 

 much enjoyment as we had when they visit Sandwich. 



