ALLIUM. 197 



bleton and Tate ; and the incident imparted an unwonted interest to 

 the meeting, and gave rise to these notes. 



Arthur Bruce is further associated with the botany of our district. 

 He was the first to observe the Eriophorum pubescens in Britain, 

 and he made this addition to its Flora " at Frogden " in Berwick- 

 shire, the birth-place of the celebrated agriculturist Dawson. See 

 Smith's Eng. Flora, i. p. 68. — Mr. Bruce appears to have been a 

 land surveyor. He was the author of a " General View of the Agri- 

 culture of the County of Berwick, with Observations on the means 

 of its improvement." It was drawn up for the consideration of 

 the Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement, and published 

 as an Appendix to Lowe's General View, 1794, 4to. He tells 

 us therein that he had been employed, for many years, in con- 

 ducting agricultural improvements in Berwickshire, p. 102; and 

 then doubtless made his botanical discoveries. My late kind friend 

 Dr. Neill wrote to me : " I was well acquainted with Mr. Arthur 

 Bruce. He was Secretary to the old Natural History Society of 

 Edinburgh, and one of the mildest and most amiable of men, and a 

 devoted practical naturalist. The leading members of the Society 

 were Lord Webb Seymour, Mr. Horner, Lord Brougham, and Mr. 

 Jeffrey, — the first two long since gone, the other two still remaining*, 

 — all distinguished in their departments. Mr. Bruce admired their 

 talents, but thought them too speculative. Professor Jameson greatly 

 disliked their liking politics, and this disagreement gave rise to the 

 Wernerian Society." — " Mr. Bruce died in the 80th year of his age, 

 respected and beloved by all who knew him. His life was singularly 

 blameless and tranquil." Dugald Stewart. He bequeathed, in 1805, 

 his whole collection of dried plants to Sir Jas. E. Smith. See Memoir 

 and Correspondence, i. p. 431 -|-. 



15. Allium arenarium = A. scorodoprasum . Don, Wern. 

 Mem. vi. 6. — B. Plentiful in some rough and stony ground near the 

 mouth of the Whiteadder ; and in large abundance in the plantation 

 above Newwaterhaugh. June. — The root bears bulbs of a purple 



* The date of Dr. Neill's letter is 15th Oct. 1849. Since then Lord 

 Jeffrey has died. He had a strong leaning to natural science in general, 

 and an especial love for scenery. In one of his letters he writes, when in 

 his 74th year : — " My affections and my enjoyment of beautiful nature, I 

 thank Heaven, are as fresh and lively aS in the first poetical daj's of my 

 youth ; and with these, there is nothing very miserable in the infirmities 

 of age." 



t It has been asserted that Mr. Bruce was also the first to discover the 

 still rarer Convallaria verticillata in Britain. Eng. Bot. ii. pi. 128. And 

 Scotch botanists amuse one another with telling a good story o' the finding 

 o' it. Mr. Bruce having caught a glance of the Convallaria in the Den of 

 Richip, descended from his pony, waved hjs hat, and hallooed to his com- 

 panions " Eureka! eureka ! !" — while the pony quietly ate up the best speci- 

 mens ! The story has some foundation in reality, but the rare plant was 

 discovered by the Rev. William M'Ritchie, the worthy minister of the 

 parish of Clunie. He directed Mr. Bruce to the habitat in the Den of 

 Richip. Stat. Ace. Scotland, ix. p. 237. Mr. Bruce found Isoetes laeus- 

 tris and Subularia aquatica, in the summer of 1 792, on the loch of Clunie. 



