260 



same as that which had been sent me from the Loch of Spynie, and 

 on comparing them they appeared identical. Not over confident, 

 however, in my own botanical discrimination, I commmiicated my 

 opinion to my disinterested friend Mr. Stables, who sent some of my 

 Nairnshire specimens to Sir W. J. Hooker. That distinguished bo- 

 tanist pronounced them to be specimens of U. minor, and this, of 

 course, I received as a final confirmation of my own opinion. 



It may not at once appear from what 1 have written, that Utricula- 

 ria intermedia has not been found in the Loch of Spynie. From cir- 

 cumstances, however, which have come under my cognizance, I have 

 not the least doubt that all the specimens gathered there as U. inter- 

 media have belonged to the other species — Utricularia minor. To 

 confirm what T say, let me present the reader with the following ex- 

 tract from a ' Collectanea for a Flora of Moray,' published in 1839. — 

 "U. intermedia. Observed to flower annually since 1830, in some 

 holes whence turf seems to have been cut, under the north bank of 

 the Loch of Spynie, about half a mile west from Ardivol. If there 

 he a specific difference hetween this and U. minor, the Spynie plant 

 upon closer inspection will probably be found to belong to the latter 

 species.^'' 



I request the reader's attention to that part of the extract which T 

 have marked for Italics ; it implies a doubt concerning the existence 

 of any specific distinction between U. interaiedia and U. minor. 

 This at once convinces me that the writer of it had never gathered U. 

 intermedia, and that the specimens in his possession were specimens 

 of U. minor. The former I have never seen, except as figured in Sir 

 J. E. Smith's ^ English Botany ; ' but presuming from the correctness 

 with which U. vulgaris and minor are there given, that U. intermedia 

 also is correctly figured, I have not a doubt as to the truly specific 

 distinctness of all three ; and I think that U. intermedia would more 

 readily be confounded with vulgaris than with minor. It seems ra- 

 ther surprising that the Spynie plant should ever have been mistaken, 

 as it appears to have been. 



Perhaps the following description of the three species of Utricula- 

 ria, from ' The Northern Flora,' may be acceptable to the reader. 



1. Utricularia vulgaris. 



" Plant floating, of considerable size, sometimes fully a foot long. Leaves green, 

 composed of numerous capillary or bristle-like segments, fringed at the margin, and 

 carrying small, beautiful, reticulated bladders. Flowers yellow, placed upon a leafless 

 stem, which elevates them several inches above the water: lower lip longer than the 



