SHORT NOTES AND QUERIES. BOT 
may be termed Parmelia saxatilis, var. omphalodes f. subconcentrica, is on 
several accounts very interesting. Not only does it show the origin of 
such erratic Lichens, but it also indicates the manner in which their globu- 
lar shape is produced. easoning from analogy we may infer that, 
notwithstanding assertions to the contrary (not even in all probability 
excepting the * Lichen manna,’ Lecanora esculenta, and L. affinis), they 
are not free ab initio, but have been detached by atmospherical or other 
causes from the parent thallus, on which, as in the present case, an in 
that of P. tiliacea f. concentrica, they had originally appeared in an ab- 
normal and excessively panniform state, in consequence of the natural 
development of the lobes having been somehow arrested. Again, we may 
also infer that after detachment, they still continue, for some time at least, 
to grow, and that their globular shape is caused by repeated involutions 
of the newly acquired portions of the thallus, as they are tossed about b. 
the wind in bare places, without finding a suitable substratum to which 
they may become affixed. This is shown by the circumstance that the 
two specimens of the form under notice, which still adhered to the thallus 
were only half globular, resembling a ball eut in two, while the one on 
he ground was nearly three-fourths globular, and was when gathered 
vidently in a fair way of soon becoming so completely. Unfortunately a 
heavy and protracted fall of rain prevented me from searching for other 
specimens, which probably 1 might have found. On another of the 
boulders referred to, I met also with a curious state of P. sazatilis, appa- 
rently hitherto unnoticed, in which the thallus bore a single blackish 
glomerulus, similar to that of Ricasolia amplissima, and which may be 
termed f. glomulifera. 
SHORT NOTES AND QUERIES. 
HE DzurscENCE or THE CAPSULE IN THE GENUS CurHEa.—In 
Masters’ ‘ Vegetable Teratology,’ p. 210, there are figures, after Morren, 
of what is referred to as a curious condition in some flowers of Cuphea 
miniata, in which the placenta protruded through an orifice in the ovary, 
i o this condition bs ^ 
Mm every case in which the capsule was matured, it seems most probable 
that this is not an hypertrophied condition of the placenta, but the nor- 
mal mode of dehiscence of the capsule in this genus.—F RED. I. WARNER. 
Puyreuma sPrcATUM.—In June, 1825, the Rev. Ralph Price found 
this plant on the estate of the late Mr. Day, at Hudlow (Mayfield). It 
was growing plentifully near the hedge of a hop-garden. Mr. Price col- 
lected many specimens and sent them to one of the botanical societies— 
I think the Linnean. It was not considered an English p Mr. 
