I860.] FLEMING SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE. 119 



peculiarly barren of the Orchis tribe, of which there are only two 

 representatives. The rarer of these is the green-winged Meadow 

 Orchis, Orchis Morio. The Lily tribe is no better represented, 

 the Blue-bell or wild Hyacinth, Hyacinthus nonscrij^tus , being 

 the only plant of that family in our local Flora. The Arrow- 

 head, Sagiitaria sagittifoJia, the flowering Rush, Butomus umbel- 

 latus, and the opposite-leaved Poudweed, Potamogeton densus, 

 are found in the canal. The greater, and gibbous Duckweed, 

 Lemna polyrrhiza and gibba, are tolerably common in pools. The 

 grey Sedge, Carex dividsa, is the only plant of its family in this 

 neighbourhood which can advance a claim to be set down as rare. 

 Its occurs at the edge of a pool in Roxeth. The hard Meadow 

 Grass, Glycerin rigida, and the wall Fescue Grass, Festuca 

 Pseudomyurus, both occur on the garden wall at the Grove. 

 The tall Brome Grass, Broinus giganteus, occurs in quantity in 

 Harrow Park. Willdenow^s Fern, Aspidium angulare, grows in 

 the lane leading from Pinner to Harrow Weald. The Adder's- 

 tongue, OpMogJossum vulgatum, is to be found in the moist parts 

 of the Eighty Acres. 



FLEMING SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE. 



New College, Edinburgh. ^ 



This Society met on the 21st February, and the following were 

 the papers communicated ; — 



1. Palseontological Botanj'^, by William Carruthers, Esq., 

 F.R.P.S.E. In this paper the author gave an account of the 

 different conditions in which fossil plants are found, and re- 

 marked that as it is only the harder tissues that are preserved, 

 the probability is that we have but a very imperfect record of 

 ancient plant-life. He then gave a rapid sketch of the different 

 plants found in each of the great geologic formations, and summed 

 up by urging the testimony of the rocks as fatally objectionable 

 to Mr. Darwin^s recent theory, for they tell of no condition of 

 life represented by simple organisms, which gradually by dif- 

 ferentiation become altered to higher beings. But they record 

 the appearance on the earth at the same time of many highly 

 developed representations of different subdivisions of the animal 

 kingdom, and the earliest certain remains of plants testify to the 



