TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION EK. 687 
angustifolium, Orchis incarnata, Carex stellulata, Carex ovalis were found in an 
ordinary pond, along with common wet-meadow species. The first had never 
been found in East Leicestershire, and the third is chiefly restricted to the 
Charnwood district. This is a vestige of an earlier bog, doubtless extensive, when, 
before the enclosure, the whole tract was woodland. Similar bogs are indicated 
by small swampy tracts, a yard or so in area, with Gnanthe Lac. henalit and 
bog mosses in two spots, and Scirpus compressus, Orchis incarnata, and other 
bog-mosses at King’s Norton. Here again these vestiges were completely sur- 
rounded by mesophytic vegetation. 
Heaths, too, are still indicated by similar vestiges. Near the Hriophorum 
bog is a tract covered with clumps of Nardus stricta, also practically unknown 
in East Leicestershire, associated with Pedicularis sylvatica (very rare here) 
and ericetal lichens, in addition to common ericetal phanerogams. Again, near 
the last spot, Galium saxatile, Polygonum hydropiper, and other ericetal species, 
e.g., Sieglingia cropped up, as a further example. Nome other heaths nearer 
Leicester, to-day closely grazed, are represented by Thymus, Stellaria graminea, 
Festuce, but particularly by ericetal mosses. These last survive after Ulex and 
all the typical common and heath plants have disappeared. 
Two points are thus clearly established. Firstly, amongst mesophytic plant- 
formations the existence of other and once prevalent natural formations can be 
detected by the presence of vestigial elements, by aid of which it can be possible 
to reconstruct the true original type of vegetation. 
Secondly, the paucity of phanerogamic plants afforded by these vestiges, 
though sufficient perhaps in themselves to establish the type of vegetation, may 
be satisfactorily balanced by the usually accompanying cryptogamic flora, which 
is often abundant and survives where phanerogams have become extinct. 
