BOTANY 



A BRIEF glance at a map of Cornwall would prepare the average 

 field botanist for a rich harvest. Favoured geographically, in- 

 asmuch as they come within range of the genial operations of 

 the Gulf Stream ; including a coast line which may be taken 

 approximately as 250 miles ; furnished with a chain of bold hills 

 forming a sort of backbone to the county ; and including among other 

 advantages densely wooded and well watered valleys opening to the sea on 

 both the north and the south coast, a good deal of land peculiarly favour- 

 able to paludal and ericetal plants, and long stretches of beach and 

 blown sand where all kinds of littoral subjects lurk, the 887,740 acres 

 of which from a botanical point of view Cornwall is comprised hold 

 probably a larger number of species than any other British county of 

 the same size. If meteorological values be added to the map 

 another key will have been furnished to the richness of the flora. To 

 say nothing of the high mean bright sunshine, and of the mean range 

 of temperature for the coldest months whereby the winters become 

 ' languid springs,' the rainfall is so high, and taking the county as a 

 whole so erratic, as greatly to modify the botanical features. Compared 

 with many other English counties Cornwall's mean rainfall of 48 inches 

 is rather great, but its peculiarity does not end there. Although only 80 

 miles in its greatest length there is a marked contrast between the rain- 

 fall of the two extremes of the county. East Cornwall has an average 

 rainfall of 55 inches and west Cornwall 43 inches. The higher figure 

 corresponds with the greatest breadth of the county, which may be taken 

 as 45 miles, and the lower with the narrowest section, which in one 

 place falls below 6 miles. As will subsequently appear, the two sections 

 so marked off have their own characteristic floras. East Cornwall may 

 be regarded as the haunt of Rubi, and west Cornwall as the district of 

 Leguminosa and Characea. 



The only islands off the Cornish coast possessing special botanical 

 interest are the Scillies, lying 27 miles west of the Land's End. Between 

 the flora of these islands and the mainland there is much in common, 

 though the absence of hills, woods and rivers tells a very important tale. 

 Nearly two-thirds of the plants growing on the mainland have been 

 found on the Scillies. Among the absentees however are several very 

 common species. Plants which have been found there and not on 

 Cornish soil proper are Polygala calcarea (one specimen), Trifolium repens 

 var. Townsendtt, Ornithopus ebracteatus, Filago spathulata^ Eleocbaris uniglumis, 

 i 49 7 



