88 Report of Meetings for 1885. By Jas. Hardy. 



tible among the heather by the tops of some of the trees 

 running in lines like thorn fences after a snow-drift. One is 

 surprised when they are reached at the extent of the space they 

 actually cover, and that it is a day's work to explore them. 



There is another deep wooded hollow of a similar character 

 hidden in the back of Blackcastle hill, named Oauld Burn, where 

 the wood vetch and Cidoptens fragilis are most profusely de 

 veloped. It is closed at the bottom, and not readily reached 

 unless one knows beforehand how to gain admittance. This is 

 best effected by coming in at the head from Blackcastle hill. 

 This ravine is double at the upper part, and is dissected deeply out 

 of conglomerate, and the overlyirig earth and gravel, — is grassy 

 and boggy and tree-grown on the outer maigins, and rocky at 

 the bottom, with only room for the burn, and one can only get 

 down or up the centre by trusting to insecure projections of the 

 conglomerate, and holding on by the asperities of the walls. 

 Among the trees are ashes, oaks, and hazels, but the chief cover- 

 ing is birch and scrubby grey willows. On the southern verge 

 and all along the slopes facing Shippath is a thickly planted 

 juniper bank. Near the wood-edges, Melampyrum p> a tense 

 grows. The wild flora much resembles that of the other glens. 

 The soil, however, is better and deeper, and dry and moisture 

 loving plants are intermingled. ' The following were noted down: 



Ajuga reptans, Hedera Helix. 



Prunella vulgaris. Rosa canina. 



Crepis paludosa. spinossissima. 



Solidago virgaurea. Sanicula Europasa. 



Vicia sylvatica. Anemone nemorosa. 



Geum x-ivale. Luzula sylvatica. 



Arrhenantherutn avenaceum. pilosa. 



Polypodiutri vulgare. Oxalis acetosella. 



Asperula odorata. Myosotis sylvatica. 



Mercurialis perennis, Carex laevigata. 



Lysimachia nemorum. Parnassia palustris. 



Primula vulgaris. Carduus heterophyllus. 



Geranium Robertianum. Polystichum aculeatum. 



sylvaticum. var. lobatum. 



Alchemilla vulgaris. Cistopteris fragilis. 



Hypericum quadrangulum. Melampyrum pratense. 



• pulchrum. Lastrea, Athyrium, etc. 



Valeriana officinalis. 



I went in at the top and found my way out at the bottom by 

 holding on between the rocky walls and trusting implicitly in 



