396 PEiMULACE^. [Primula. 



" Welcome, pale Primrose ! starting up between 

 Dead matted leaves of Ash and Oak, that strew 

 The every lawn, the wood, and spinney through, 

 'Mid creeping moss and Ivy's darker green ; 



How much thy presence beautifies the ground; 

 How sweet thy modest, unaffected pride 

 Glows on the sunny bank and wood's warm side. 



And where thy fairy flowers in groups are found 

 The schoolboy roams enchantedly along. 



Plucking the fairest with a rude delight : 

 While the meek shepherd stops his siiiiple song. 



To gaze a moment on the pleasing sight; 

 O'eijoy'd to see the flowers that truly bring 

 The welcome news of sweet returning spring." 



Clare. 



" Pale Primroses 



That die unmarried, eie they can behold 

 Bright Phcebus in his strength." 



Wialerh Tale. 



1. v. vulgaris, Huds. Common Primrose. " Leayes oblong- 

 ovate crenate toothed wrinkled, scape umbellate usually sessile 

 sometimes on a common stalk, flowers erect, caljTc tubular some- 

 wliat inflated, teeth linear-lanceolate attoiuated very acute, limb 

 of tlie corolla flat, tube with a circle of scale-like folds at the 

 sligiitly contracted mouth."— ^r. Fl. p. 329. E. B. t. 4. 



/3. Flowers pure white, with a yellow eye. 



y. Flowers bright purplish red. 



I. caulescens. Scape umbellate, flowers deeper yellow. 



£. Flowers double. 



Tn woods, thickets and groves, on banks, under hedges and about the borders of 

 fields, also in open meadows and pastures; most abundantly. Fl. March — 

 June. If. 



/3. About Ryde, occasionally, as solitary specimens. Whitefield wood, and I 

 think also in Quarr copse. Symington copse, between Sonierford and Medham 

 faniis, in one ^pot abundantly. Near I/andguard farm, the Mliss Herons .'.' Very 

 fine and plentiful in a copse near the Medina, by N. Fairlee, G. Kirkpalriek, 

 JSsq. 



y. Wood between Stcephill and St. Lawrence, Albert Hdinhrough, E.tq.H! 

 Abundant on banks in the grounds at Montpellier house (nou an hotel), Vent- 

 nor, but probably disseminated from roots originally planted, the variety being 

 frequent in gardens. In the former station this beautiful variety is truly wild, 

 and growing in a clump of considerable extent. Field by IMorton house. Dr. 

 Brll-SiiUer (wild?). [Banks in several places in St. Helens parish, trul> wild. 

 Dr. Bell-Suiter., Edrs.] 



S. In copses occasionally. In a copse betwixt Shanklin and Bonchurch I 

 found, April, 1R49, two roots of this variety. The copse was full of Primroses, 

 but not a single Cowslip was to be found in or near the -jpol ; the leaves were 

 truly those of the Primrose, and, excepting in the umbellate flowers and their 

 somewhat deeper colour, the plants differed in nothing from ilie ordinary Prim- 

 roses which grjw around them. In March, 1842, I found a variety of tlie Prim- 

 rose, in a wood between St. Lawrence and Niton, with the usual stemlcss flowers, 

 but the latter were slightly concave and more deeply coloured Ihan usual, betray- 

 ing the first approach to the Oxlip or intermediate state between the Primrose and 

 Cowslip. [Field under Benibridge down, A. G. Jffore, £■(/., ICdrs.] 



[In the wet wood by Lane-end, Bembridge, truly wild. Miss Caroline Bomford. 

 —Edrs.] 



Root very thick and fleshy, knotty, soomewhat creeping, emitting numerous 



