THE PHYTOLOGIST. 



No. VIII. 



JANUARY, MDCCCXLII. 



Price 6d. 



Art. XLI. — A Botanical Excursion in Teesdale, in July, 1840. 

 By Samuel King, Esq. 



Lane House, Luddenden, near Halifax, 

 SiR^ October 20, 1841. 



Taking it for granted that any communication respecting plants will be 

 acceptable for your periodical, I take the liberty of sending a sbort account of a bota- 

 nical excursion in Teesdale in July, 1840. If you think it worth printing it is quite 

 at your service. Yours &c. 



Samuel King. 



To the Editor of ' The Phytologist.' 



On the 20th of July my companion and myself left Darlington for Barnard Cas- 

 tle, a distance of sixteen miles. The common hedge-plants of this neighbourhood are 

 Ballota nigra, Lamium album, Bryonia dioica, Potentilla reptans and anserina, Cy- 

 noglossum officinale, Lycopsis arvensis, Hordeum murinum, Conium maculatum. 

 Reseda luteola, Chaerophyllum temulentum. Lychnis vespertina, &c. We arrived at 

 Barnard Castle about 11 o'clock, and proceeded to Cotherston (a distance of four 

 miles), where we commenced our work by going up Balderdale in search of the rare 

 Saxifraga Hirculus : as we went on we observed Cnicus heterophyllus, Ribes petrsum, 

 Geranium sylvaticum, &c. After walking about four miles we arrived at Hurry ; 

 here we learned that a persou named Joseph Raine, who resided at a faim-house call- 

 ed East Waybut, knew something about the plant we were in search of. At about a 

 mile farther on we came to the house and found the man, who readily undertook to 

 conduct us to the spot where the Saxifraga was growing : he knew the plant well, and 

 gave us two specimens which he happened to have by him. When we had gone about 

 two miles farther up the valley, which is wild and barren, we crossed the water and got 

 on the edge of Cotherston Fell, about half a mile below the junction of the Black 

 Beck and Balder Beck : here we found plenty of Saxifraga Hirculus growing among 

 moss in a wet swampy place, in company with Sedum villosum, but being too early in 

 the season, we could obtain but two plants in flower. We then returned to the house 

 of our guide, and wrote our addresses with a quill pen upwards of twenty years old ; 

 in the following August our guide collected for me a number of specimens of the 

 Saxifraga, and transmitted them by post. On leaving our guide's house he directed 

 us over the fells to Middleton in Teesdale, about six miles distant; but in consequence 

 of losing our road on the fells, we did not arrive there until late. 



Next morning, accompanied by Mr. Thompson, the landlord of the Talbot Inn, 

 we started for High Force Inn, distant five miles, calling in our way at New Bigging. 

 Thence we passed over the fields to Winch Bridge, where the Tees is crossed by a 

 foot bridge. Here the troubled stream of the Tees is confined by rocks, upon which, 

 and on the adjoining ground, grow Serratula tinctoria, Cnicus heterophyllus, Galium 



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