1859.] BOTANICAL NOTES, NOTICES, AND QUERIES. 191 



but of wliicli I cannot find either a drawing or a description. M. patula 

 is Sowerby's Hchella escidenta, a synonym of our common Morel, or a 

 variety of it. John Lloyd's plant partly agrees with Withering's Phallus 

 esculentus, especially in the stem. 



Our readers are Avarned not to trust to the specific name, esculent ; 

 Mr. Lloyd remembers having eaten a bit of a Morel similar to the one he 

 sent, and which he gathered near Shere, in Surrey, and experienced a pain- 

 ful sensation in his palate and throat, viz. a swelling, with intense inflam- 

 mation and a difficulty of swallowing. This uncomfortable state remained 

 for some hours. E. 



Claytonia alsinoides. 



A fine specimen of this plant has just been received from Mr. Sim, who 

 collected it in the woods of Scone Palace, near Perth. He says that he 

 there obtained a good supply of specimens. He also found Aremonia agri- 

 monioides widely distributed in patches here and there throughout the 

 wood. He collected Gei-anium ph(eum in the same locality. 



Description of Claytonia alsinoides : — Pi-oot fibrous ; stems several, succu- 

 lent, cylindrical, quite smooth, slightly reddish at the base, with a single 

 pair of opposite leaves under the first flowering-branch; leaves ovate- 

 rhomboid, tapering, entu'e succident and quite smooth, on long, reddish 

 foot- stalks, all radical ; stem-leaves rounded, sessile, and veiy shortly 

 or abruptly pointed. Sepals two, roundish, short ; petals white, cleft, four 

 times as long as the sepals ; stamens shorter than the petals, with red ver- 

 satile anthers. Annual. Flowers in May. 



This American genus, or species of an American genus, is not known as 

 a European plant, excepting in two stations in the British Isles ; viz. in 

 the woods of Scone, Perthshire, first observed by oar obsei^ant contribu- 

 tor, Mr. Sim, and also in the woods of Edensor, Dei'byshire, discovered by 

 Sir Joseph Paxton, or by some one who communicated it to him. The 

 Edensor example was subsequently transmitted to Mr. Baxter, of Oxford, 

 who published it in his ' Genera of British Plants.' It has been steadily 

 ignored by our descriptive botanical authors. Claytonia perfoliata has 

 been several times recorded, and has been even admitted into the ' Cybele,' 

 but her less fortunate sister has hitherto been unnoticed ; her charms have 

 attracted no admirers ; obscurity and neglect have been her untoward fate. 



The Blasted Heath, 



Where Macbeth and Banquo met the Three Weird Sisters. 

 (See ' Phytologist,' vol. iii. p. 150, and Shakespeare's ' Macbeth,' act i. scene iii.) 



Sii', — Some one has told us that the insane root gi'ows in Pifeshire, the 

 site of the blasted heath where Macbeth met the witches, etc. Is this 

 heath in Eifeshire ? The fabulous or mythic bfittle with the Danes or 

 Norwegians may have been in that ancient kingdom. But the scene of 

 the witches' meeting with the victorious thanes was near Eoitcs, in Nairn- 

 shire, more than a hundred miles from " the eastraost neuk of Eife." 



Before the victors Macbeth and Banquo met the witches, the latter 

 says, " How far is 't called to Fores ? " 



And in the scene-directions to scene ii. the heading is, " A camp near 



