MEDICAGO. — TRIFOHUM. 53 



132. Medicago lupulina. ^tlloiD=Clobttr. Meadows and 

 pastures. Sown, with other seeds, on dry sandy soils, where it an- 

 swers very well. 



6. M. sativa. Lucerne. B. Has naturalized itself on the banks 

 of the Whiteadder near Whitehall, G. Henderson.— D. In Haiden 

 dean. Holy-Island hnks. Dr. F. Douglas. Has been gathered in 

 several other stations, but not permanent ui them, and it would soon 

 disappear from our district were it not occasionally imported anew 

 with seed of corn and grasses. The Lucerne, says Link, is not a 

 native of Europe, for it only grows wild where it is now cultivated, 

 or formerly had been. Our farmers neglect it. 



133. Melilotus OFFICINALIS = Trifolium officinale. D. "By 

 the path to the bathing well at Comhill, near a streamlet," Wallis. 

 — B. Sea banks of the Maudlin fields ; and in pastures near North- 

 field. Plentiful on the banks of the Tweed about Coldstream, Miss 

 E. Bell. Birgham or Briggeham haugh. Dr. R. D. Thomson. July. 



134. M. VULGARIS = M. leucantha, Hooker Brit. PI. (1830) i. 

 327. — N. Coupland plantations near Wooler, J. Mitchell. B. About 

 Berwick Castle ; and on waste ground between it and Castle-hills. 

 It abounded in this locality in the summer of 1842 : in the following 

 summer only a few plants appeared ; and in a year or two afterwards 

 not a specimen was to be got. Mr. Watson considers it an alien 

 because of its " fugitive endurance, and the suspicious nature of its 

 localities." I do not assent. Let the ground be stirred up anew, 

 and we should again have plenty of the M. vulgaris in its old locality ; 

 — again to die away, — and to revive again when circumstances favoured 

 the growth. Experiments almost assure us that of all plants the 

 Leguminous have seeds which retain their vitality longest. Botanical 

 Gazette, iii. p. 105. 



135. Trifolium repens. Don Gard. Diet. ii. 188. IButcf) or 

 OTIjttEjClDber : ^i)eep'jif@oSuan : and the flowering heads are our 

 WSi^iXt'^oakim. — Meadows and pastures, everywhere. " White 

 Clover is one of those plants that grow in almost all soils and all 

 situations, and being a true perennial, is always sown in this district 

 where lands are intended for permanent pasture." Bailey and Cully's 

 View, p. 115. There is a very general belief that white Clover will 

 appear in abundance on our moors when the soil is turned up for the 

 first time and lime applied*; and the phenomenon is always men- 

 tioned as mysterious and inexplicable. See Winch's Geogr. Essay, 

 p. 17: Quart. Rev. xxxvi. p. 586. Mr. Watson has apparently 

 solved the problem and dissipated the wonder. The fact is not a 

 fact, but an inference founded on imperfect observation. Cyb. Brit, 

 i. p. 291. — The scent from a white-clovered field in flower, floated 

 on the summer breeze, is very sweet ; and then the field is alive with 

 myriads of active bees. — A variety with purple leaves sometimes occurs 



* In Notes and Queries, vi. p. 112, the version is thus given : — " On a 

 Scotch moor, too, after a fire sufficiently strong to destroy the roots of the 

 heather, Clover invariably appears." Is this a fact? 



