1864] Discovery of Chara alopecur aides. 165 



time. The opportunity which guided him to this rectifi- 

 cation of a misnomer was the more singular, since no 

 Gladiolus has ever, from that time, been gathered at 

 Shanklin ; and not for more than twenty years after Mrs. 

 Phillipps 5 happy discovery were the next Isle of Wight 

 specimens of this handsome plant lighted upon, among 

 some bracken near Sandown. 



He wished now to give more examination to the 

 western coast, and in June spent some time at Freshwater, 

 where he added several plants (Fumaria muralis, Carex 

 teretiuscula, and Poa nemoralis) to the flora of the island. 

 Now too he made his first effort since his illness at 

 Christmas to recommence work for the "Annals of Natural 

 History," writing the review of Babington's Manual (fifth 

 edition) which appeared in the July number. During the 

 greater part of the summer he lodged by himself at Bern- 

 bridge (for better access to his books), his family having 

 moved to Ryde. He carried on, when his health per- 

 mitted, an extensive botanical correspondence, taking 

 particular interest in the progress of Mr. G. S. Gibson's 

 "Flora of Essex/' But on the whole this "last year at 

 Bembridge " was the most trying period he had gone 

 through, and the long breaks in his correspondence are 

 but too easily accounted for. 



His best discovery, however, was made in August. In 

 that month, botanizing beside Newtown Creek, he found, 

 " covering the bottom of the shallow brine-pans at the 

 west mouth," a Chara, which on examination proved to be 

 the Chara alopecuroides of Delile, a species quite new to 

 Britain. This discovery, after he and Mr. Babington had 

 agreed as to the identification, led to a correspondence 

 with M. J. Gay, of Paris, an authority on European Cha- 

 raceae, and one of the earliest botanists who had studied 

 this species ; it appeared that he had " many years since 

 given it the MS. name of Chara pouzolzii, in honour of 

 M. Pouzolz, who discovered it in Corsica." M. Gay con- 

 firmed the identification of the Isle of Wight plant as 

 C. alopecuroides. 



The new Chara being, in Mr. Babington's opinion, 

 " one of the most interesting additions that had recently 



