1862.] BOTANICAL NOTES^ NOTICES, AND QUERIES. 255 



Clover, are not to be allowed to have " all their own way," or to walk their 

 pet plant over the course and claim the victory. There is another candi- 

 date for this honour, viz. Oxalis corniculata, a very rare |riant indeed in 

 Great Britain. Does it grow commonly in Ireland ? No reasonable man 

 can doubt " the possibility of the true Shamrock being neither Trifolium 

 repeiis nor Oxalis ^cetosella." Any trifoliate plant, like Buckbean or 

 Medicago InpuUiia or the barren Strawberry, or the fertile one either, 

 would have answered the Saint's purpose equally as well as either of the 

 popular favourites. 



Some curious readers might wish to learn what the Irish people them- 

 selves, or the poetic, heraldic, and antiqnarian part of them, think about 

 the claims advanced in support of the three rivals now in the fii kl. Also 

 British botanists might like to know why Trifolium repens did not grow in 

 Ireland in the fifth century. It is one of the very commonest species of 

 the genus in England ; and if it be an introduced plant in Ireland, it pro- 

 bably is so also in all the British Isles. Again, it might be satisfactory 

 to hear what sort of monasteries existed in Ireland before St. Patrick's 

 advent : were they Druidical, Celtiberian, Carthaginian ? certainly not 

 Christian. Epsilon. 



Shamrock. — Trifolium v. Oxalis. 



I am not satisfied with Mr. Ferguson's conclusion, that because Eynes 

 Moryson says, " the poor Irish willingly eat the herb ScJtainrock, being of 

 a ishcap taste, which they snatch like beasts out of the ditches," therefore 

 the Oxalis Acelosdla is the true Shamrock of St. Patrick ; and to sup- 

 port the opinion that Trifolium has the greater claim, I give the following, 

 from ' Synopsis Stirpium Hibernicarum,' by Caleb Threlkeld, M.D. : — 

 " Trifoliuiu pratense «Z(5i«w;, White-flowered Meadow Trefoyl. The Meadow 

 Trefoyls are called in Irish, Shamrocks, as Gerard writes in his Herbal, 

 which was first published 1597. The words Seamar Leaune and Seamar 

 Oge being in signification the same, the first signifying the Child's Trefoyl, 

 the other the Young Trefoyl, to distinguish them from the Seamar Capiul, 

 or Horse Trefoyl, as I suppose." In the appendix to this work, by Dr. 

 Thomas Molyneux, Physician to the State, we find Trifolium acetosimi, 

 "VYood Sorrel, in Irish, Seanisug, with several other names, but it is not 

 called Shamrock. 



As the plant referred to by Fynes Moryson grew in ditches, how can 

 Mr. Ferguson believe that it could be the Oxalis Jcetosella, which grows 

 in woods and shady places on elevated spots ? — besides which, could this 

 plant afford anything like food to the poor persecuted Irish ? It would 

 however be satisfactory to know the particular part of Ireland in which the 

 ditches were, as referred to by Fynes Moryson, for the purpose of knowing 

 what kind of plants now grow there. 



Note. In Hone's 'Every Day Book,' March 17, Shamrock is called 

 Trifolium repens. S. Beisly. 



POLYGONATUM MULTIFLORUM AND ViBURNUM LaNTANA. 



Since I last wrote I have found a station for both Polggonatum multi- 

 florum and Viburnum Lantana in this neighbourhood, and consequently 

 these species may be added to the list of uncommon plants to be found 



