296 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
cannot be called fertile, and this leads me to speak of the 
generally waste appearance of the region. The town 
straggles a good deal, and there is a great amount of 
building land unoccupied. ‘Where this, as is often the 
case, 1s plentifully sprinkled with cinders, and the cinders 
well and continuously trodden into a mixture of glacial 
clay and sand, vegetation has not much chance, irrespec- 
tive of chemicals. 
Howbeit, there is an enclosed space rather to the N.H. 
of the chemical works near Tanhouse Lane Station which 
may be taken as typical. It is not extensive, but the 
crops on the arable land which bounds it show a decided 
falling off on the side next to the works, and I regard 
some of the land, though fenced, as undoubtedly affected 
by the chemicals. Yet on it grow and flourish Agropyrum 
repens and Carex cespitosa. And the moss, Funaria 
hygrometrica, abundant and luxuriant on the waste tips, 
manages to fruit even on the platform at Tanhouse Lane. 
At a little distance the ordinary town weeds assert them- 
selves, and a mile or so into the country the ponds 
produce a large and varied aquatic flora. 
But the really remarkable examples of resistance to 
chemicais are to be found on the marshes of the Mersey. 
I can hardly find a plant of which I can certainly say that 
it has been seriously affected by them. 
I give a list of the saline plants; I took stock of them 
first on Cuerdley Marsh, well away from the smoke, and 
next examined Widnes Marsh. With the exception of 
Triglochin maritimum, a plant easily overlooked, I found 
the same species under the factory chimneys as on the - 
open marsh. The sea-pink flowers, and to make up for 
the loss of T'riglochin, the wild celery, Apiwm graveolens, 
appears; and, as for the grasses, I am told that Widnes 
Marsh is the better pasture. 
