SEA-SIDE PLANTS. 77 



Rape has purplish-red flowers, and stem of some- 

 what similar hue, tinged with yellow. It has no 

 leaves, but a scaly stem. Very similar, and equally 

 rare, is the Purple Broom Rape ( Orobanche cceru- 

 leajy which grows in grassy pastures, near the sea, 

 and is parasitical on the roots of other plants. 



A very pretty little bulbous flower of the genus 

 Trichonema (Trichonema columns) 9 which is one of 

 the beautiful Iris family, and the smallest of them 

 all, has been found on one or two spots on the 

 southern coast of England. Here and there, too, 

 on grassy sandy places,, near the sea, one of our 

 three species of wild flax (Linum angustifolium] 

 rears its pale-blue erect bell, in June and July ; 

 and rare as are primroses, save beneath the shadow 

 of woodland boughs or in mountain solitudes, yet 

 there is one kind which graces the shore. This is 

 the Scottish Primrose {Primula Scotica), and a very 

 lovely little flower it is. Primroses generally seem 

 fearless of cold winds. We know how they come 

 out by thousands in our woods, when the wild 

 winds of spring are not yet soothed into summer 

 stillness, and the traveller on the high hills stoops 

 down to smile on them amid the mountain snows. 

 The breezes which play around the Orkney Isles 

 are none of the mildest, yet they often bow down 

 the blossoms of this Primrose ; and rare as it is 

 elsewhere, it is frequent on the northern coast of 

 Sunderland, and has been gathered from the north 

 coast of Caithness. It is so different from other 

 primroses, and so peculiar to the shore, that the 

 reader who should happen to find it, might easily 

 know it. It has a deep bluish purple blossom, 

 with a yellow centre ; and though a stout and 

 sturdy-looking plant, its flowers are small. Its 



