14 Mr. C. C. Babington on a new British Viola. 



*e 



ence need not present any difficulty, as those of V. stagnina are 

 pale blue when fresh but nearly white when dried : their spur is 

 short, but manifestly longer than the appendages of the calyx, 

 very blunt, and nearly as green as the calyx. This greenness of 

 the spur is stated to be constant in this and one or two other 

 species, but I have had no experience of it. The spurs of the 

 anthers are decidedly blunt. The capsules I have not seen, but 

 they are stated to be truncate-obtuse and without elevated 

 nerves. 



This species consists, as do most of its allies, of two forms, a 

 larger and a smaller, between which there is often so much differ- 

 ence of appearance as at first sight to lead to the opinion that 

 they are distinct specifically ; but an examination of them shows 

 that such is not the fact. Our present plant is the smaller form 

 of what in its larger state is rather extensively distributed in 

 Germany and France, and in its smaller is not very unfrequent 

 in Scandinavia. 



This plant is far more nearly allied to V. stagnina than to any 

 of our other violets, but the green colour of the corolla-spur, the 

 differently shaped leaves, and remarkably different stipules clearly 

 distinguish it. The short corolla-spur, and also that of the 

 anthers, would be quite a sufficient cause for separating it from 

 V. canina, even if the presence of a rhizome (which however I 

 have not had an opportunity of seeing) in V. stricta had not 

 afforded so manifest a distinction between them. In V. pratensis 

 (Koch), which is very nearly allied to our plant, the central sti- 

 pules are longer than the petioles (not ~ of their length), the 

 limb of the leaves is markedly decurrent on to the petioles, and 

 the spur of the corolla is not green. 



In his invaluable ' Herbarium Norm ale ' (iv. 44) Fries states 

 that specimens of V. lactea from Smith himself are exactly V. 

 pratensis which is there named by him V. lactea accordingly, 

 but in his 'Mantissa tertia' (123) he corrects that error, which 

 originated from his not having then learned to distinguish V. lanci- 

 folia (his V. pumila, not that of Villars, which is V. pratensis), 

 my V. canina /3. lancifolia, from V. pratensis. 



In Hooker and Arnott's ' British Flora ' (Addenda) I am stated 

 to give the name of V. stagnina to the violet which they " and 

 most others call V. lactea," but it seems to me that great diffi- 

 culty exists in determining what " most " botanists really do call 

 V. lactea. It is even difficult to tell what is the true plant of 

 Hooker and Arnott, as in their text they seem to include under 

 that name V. lancifolia and V. stagnina, but in their Addenda 

 they state that their V. lactea is what I call V. stagnina, although 

 many of the localities given for it manifestly are those of V. lan- 

 cifolia. The V. lactea of British botanists is most frequently 



