ABNORMALITY IN FOXGLOVE. 
HAROLD J. BURKILL, M.A., F.R.G.S. 
THE abnormal specimen of Digitalis purpurea described by 
Miss Poulton in the last issue of The Naturalist prompted me 
to look up my notes on a similar find from near Hackness, 
Scarborough, found on 27th August, 1902. 
The plant was forty-two inches in height, growing: in an 
exposed situation at the edge of a large heather moor. There 
were other Foxgloves near to it, but all these were normal 
plants. The upper portion of the plant was extremely 
abnormal, and contained nine immature buds at the tip of 
the stalk, then twenty-four flowers which were irregular 
throughout and no two alike except in the number of parts 
displaying abnormal tendencies. 
The sepals varied in number, size, and position round the 
a=peta!ls. b=styles. c=stamen, d=ovary. e=sepals. 
flower. Sometimes there were only two or three, but never 
more than five. 
The corolla was split into petals of various shapes and 
sizes, some being more like cotton threads, while the width of 
the largest one was nine-sixteenths of an inch. They varied 
in number from two to four, and were sometimes cut into 
lobes at the tip, a few of them being somewhat deeply notched. 
Their position round the ovary was also very irregular, some- 
times all the petals being on one side of the flower-head. 
The ovary ended in some flowers in two points (as in B 
and C), while one was treble, each point having its own style. 
The flowers were mostly without stamens, but some of 
them had one (as in A). 
The colour of the petals was slightly darker than the 
normal colour of the type plant. 
The figure D shows the position and relative sizes of sepals 
and petals in a cross section through the flower C. 
I9t3 Oct.1. 
