I860.] PLANTS OF LINDORES ABBEY. 367 



which you have sent. The eight cilia of the inner joem/ome are 

 hoivever ahvays present, although shorter and somewhat less re- 

 gular. These cilia are invariably wanting in our common species, 

 and in it the capsule has uniformly sixteen strice, and the leaves 

 shorter, less acuminate, and at the same time less r-igid. 

 ''Nov. 11, 1860. "W. P. S." 



Plants of Lindores Abbey, near Neivburgh, County of Fife. 

 By John Sim, A.B.S.Ed. 



The middle of October is not the most favourable season of the 

 year for collecting or observing the floral treasures of our country, 

 yet to the botanist, the lover and admirer of the Great Creator's 

 handiworks, no season of the year is entirely devoid of interest. 



On the 18th of the present month I took train from Perth to 

 Newburgh (a distance of eleven miles and a half), in order to 

 visit a medical friend, and get some knowledge of the Flora of the 

 " kingdom of Fife,^' as far as my botanical friend's researches had 

 been extended. The abbey, or rather ruins, of Lindores is situ- 

 ated about half a mile eastward of Newburgh, and is a most ex- 

 tensive mass of ruins, built of a sort of reddish sandstone, and 

 amply ornamented with the common Ivy. The parts of the walls 

 still standing are of prodigious thickness, and the entire building 

 covers, I should suppose, nearly three acres of ground. 



But it was not for the purpose of admiring its massy architec- 

 ture or viewing its " ivy-crowned turrets, the pride of past ages,'' 

 that led my steps thither ; it was to behold the Scolopendrium 

 vulgare growing on its walls. At this an Englishman and Irish- 

 man may smile, and say, " Well, surely this plant is no great rarity .'' 

 But, candid reader, let me tell you, that as far as my knowledge 

 and experience extend, we have few rarer plants in Scotland. I 

 am well aware that it is one of the commonest Ferns in many 

 parts of Ireland, but in Scotland it is rare and local. 



I found it growing, but neither very luxuriant nor in great 

 quantity, on two different places, in both cases on the east sides 

 of these ruinous walls. I also detected a few luxuriant plants of 

 Parietaria officinalis, another rare Scottish plant, also extremely 

 abundant in Ireland, especially about Limerick. I have never 

 seen it in Scotland, save on the ruins of the abbeys of St. Andrew's 

 and Lindores, in neither place plentiful. Among the ruins of 



