641 



stream winds under brushwood. The monk's-hood grows here in 

 several places among the bushes on the top of the bank. It may give 

 some idea of the vegetation to mention that the steep sides of the val- 

 ley are covered with native coppice, rich in yew and whitebeam, out 

 of which rise here and there rugged crags of limestone. The neigh- 

 bouring woods contain Carex digitata and Melica nutans. I must 

 add that the stream does not rise in the valley, but flows into the head 

 of it, from the scattered hamlet of Itton ; and two or three cottages 

 have potato-gardens sloping down to the bank. Under these circum- 

 stances it is impossible to affirm that the monk's-hood may not for- 

 merly have been cultivated in the village, and some knobs of the roots 

 carried down the stream, a distance of about half a mile. And such 

 would be my own conclusion, if there were any strong a priori reason 

 against A. Napellus being native, beyond the certain fact that in most 

 places where it now looks wild it is a relic of old cultivation. It is 

 native in France, in Germany as far north as t^e Eifel, in Denmark, 

 and in South Scandinavia. We have (Cyb. Brit. i. 98) the opinions 

 of competent persons in favour of its nativity in three counties on the 

 borders of Wales, one of them in Monmouthshire. And the subal- 

 pine character of the locality would seem favourable to its production. 

 We must remember that if cultivation has introduced some plants it 

 has destroyed others ; and the valleys where the native vegetation is 

 rich and undisturbed are comparatively few and ill-explored. On 

 the whole, therefore, I am inclined to support the claims of A. Napel- 

 lus in Monmouthshire, though thinking it but just to describe minutely 

 the circumstances of its occurrence, as others might judge differently 

 from the same evidence. It would be interesting to examine the glens 

 of the forest district between Chepstow, Newport, and Usk ; but un- 

 fortunately that is not in my power this summer. 



F. J. A. HoRT. 



Note on the Third Volume of Mr. H. C. Watson's * Cyhele Britan- 



nica.' By F. .J. A. Hort, Esq. 



Mr. Watson, in the new volume of the * Cybele ' (p. 428), adds 

 " province I " to the area of Circaea alpina, on the authority of a list 

 published by me in the ' Phytologist ' nearly five years ago. I am 

 bound to lose no time in publicly begging him to cancel this state- 

 ment, as I ought perhaps to have done long ago. The specimen isi 

 VOL. IV. 4 N 



