36 Botany of the Shores of Lough Neagh. 



the character of the rich and varied flora of the lough, and 

 made allusion to the most noteworthy discoveries of those 

 whose names he had mentioned. Some of the plants detected 

 there by the earlier explorers, he said, were supposed to be now 

 lost through the lowering of the level of the lake by the 

 drainage works in the Lower Bann, but careful observation 

 might probably result in the restoration of some of them to the 

 list of Lough Neagh plants. One of the most important recent 

 discoveries, by which the flora had been enriched, was that of 

 a little sand-loving cress, Teesdalia nudicaulis, at Washing Bay, 

 Co. Tyrone. It occurred in some abundance, but there was a 

 question as to whether it might be indigenous. His own 

 observations led him to believe that it had long been established 

 there, and, though the ways in which a plant of the kind may 

 be introduced were manifold, one was inclined to think it might 

 be native. Recalling to mind, soon after it had been seen there, 

 that the great bulk of the sand brought from the lough b} 

 canal to Lisburn and Belfast for building and filtration purposes 

 is taken from the place where the plant is found, two of the 

 spots along the canal where the sand is discharged were 

 examined. In both, the plant was seen in quantity, with every 

 appearance of having been there for some time, which was in 

 support of the view that if not native at Lough Neagh, it was 

 by no means a recent introduction. 



Continuing, the lecturer said that the mterest belonging to 

 the occuxrQnceoi Polygonum mite at Lough Neagh, where he 

 had the good fortune to meet with it very recently on both 

 the County Antrim and County Armagh margins, consisted in 

 its being a very rare plant in Ii eland. There were, indeed, 

 only two other stations for it. In England it was also a scarce 

 plant, and it was not known in Scotland nor in Wales. 



Sometimes one saw in the lake on the Antrim border con- 

 siderable quantities of a very rare water crowfoot, Ranunculus 

 fluitans, but on examination it was found to be floating loose in 

 the water, not a single stem being attached. Were it not 

 known that it occurred in the Sixmilewater, discovered there by 



