BOTANY 



THE object in the following pages is to give a general idea of 

 what species form the native vegetation of the county, what 

 species have been introduced through the agency of man or 

 animals, the essential differences existing between the flora 

 of Northamptonshire and some of the bordering counties, to describe 

 briefly the districts based on the river drainage, into which the county 

 has been divided for botanical purposes, and to make some reference to 

 the botanists who have worked at the county flora, and to whose exer- 

 tions so much of our knowledge of it is due. 



The following tables show the number of species which have been 

 reported on good authority to have been seen growing in a wild state in 

 the counties surrounding Northamptonshire, as well as those compiled for 

 our county by myself 



If we follow fairly closely the specific limitations adopted in the 

 ninth edition of the London Catalogue of British Plants,^ which puts 

 the total number of British plants at 1,958, and make allowance for the 

 species added since that date, we may roughly say that the British flora 

 contains about 2,000 plants, but of these nearly 250 are not native 

 species, 144 are confined to the neighbourhood of the sea, while at 

 least 200 are species, either of northern latitudes, or are not found so far 

 south as Northamptonshire except in mountainous situations ; 17 species 

 are confined to Ireland, about 20 to the Channel Isles, and 2 are extinct, 

 namely Carex Davalliana and Eriophorum alpinum. 



After making these deductions about 1,350 species are left which 

 might occur in Northamptonshire, yet we find from the above table such 

 is not the case. It is true that this county is by no means com- 

 pletely investigated, and it is quite certain in respect of micro-species 



' Geo. Bell & Sons, price dd., 1895. 

 47 



