40 



FLORA OF BRITAIN. 



planted or sown (Castanea vulgaris, Crocus aureus, Linum 

 usitatissimum, &c), we may say that 1400 species is the 

 extreme limit of our present flora, from which number 

 some botanists would strike out 200, as varieties or in- 

 troduced species. Indeed, 1200 species is probably too 

 large an allowance for a rigidly exact estimate ; but in 

 accordance with the views generally entertained in the 

 present day, I should take 1400 to 1450 species as the 

 proper estimate of our flora, when wishing to make com- 

 parison numerically with that of another country, or of 

 parts of our own. 



In the Flora of Berwick we have the following sum- 

 mary : — 



Place. 



Monocotyledones. 



Dicotyledones. 



Total. 



Britain 

 England - 

 Scotland 

 Berwick 



359 

 322 

 276 

 155 



1158 



1048 



879 



526 



1517 



1370 



1155 



681 



" Of the British plants, Professor Henslow considers 

 seventeen genera and forty-five species of Dicotyledones, 

 and three genera and six species of Monocotyledones, 

 as having been naturalised. Several of those which are 

 native to England have emigrated into Scotland, where 

 they are now more or less naturalised ; but, with the ex- 

 ception of the Scotch fir, it would seem that the English 

 flora has received no accessions from her northern sister. 

 Of those which Professor Henslow marks as aliens, the 

 Flora of Berwick possesses ten species ; and no less than 

 fifty-six of the English aborigines have no better claim 

 to denization in our district." Additional Berwickshire 

 species, to the number of twenty-six, are given in the 

 History of the Berwickshire Naturalists' Club. 



The writers of our local Floras of course differ some- 

 what in their classification of plants as species or varieties, 



