Botanical Society of London. 



515 



fore to be expected that there should be the like in respect of times 

 of leafing. 



This may throw some light on the question respecting "acclima- 

 ting." It may be, that species may be brought to bear climates ori- 

 ginally ill-suited, — not by any especial virtue in the seeds ripened in 

 any particular climate, but — by multiplying seedlings, a few of which, 

 out of multitudes, may have qualities suited to this or that country, 

 e.g. some to cold, some to drought, some to wet, &c. 



In some cases, a plant's beginning to vegetate later may secure it 

 from spring frosts, which would destroy a precocious variety ; in 

 others, earlier flowering may enable a tree to ripen fruit in a climate 

 in which a later would be useless, &c. 



Further, the experiment shows that the common opinion respecting 

 the commencement of spring vegetation, — the rise of the sap from 

 the roots, through the trunk and branches to the twigs, — is ground- 

 less ; since a scion of an early variety, on a late stock, will be in leaf 

 while the stock is torpid. 



BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON. 



April 18, 1842.— Dr. Willshire in the Chair. 



Mr. Edward Doubleday exhibited a Primula found at Bardfield, 

 Essex, and stated that a few years ago his brother, Mr. Henry Dou- 

 bleday, observed that the Oxlips growing near Bardfield were striking- 

 ly different from those found in the vicinity of Epping, where the 

 Oxlip is not common ; and that further observation had induced him 

 to believe that the Bardfield plant was a distinct species, an opinion 

 in which he (Mr. E. D.) was disposed to concur. Mr. Doubleday 

 next referred to an article in the ' Gardener's Chronicle,' and point- 

 ed out the resemblance of the Bardfield plant to the one there alluded 

 to. He expressed his opinion very decidedly that there were in En- 

 gland three distinct species of Primula, known by the names of Prim- 

 rose, Cowslip or Pagel, and Oxlip, but that the Oxlip, commonly so 

 called, is nothing more than a hybrid between the Primrose and 

 Cowslip. This hybrid is extensively distributed over the country, 

 especially in localities where the Primrose and Cowslip abound : it 

 constantly exhibits a tendency to revert to the Primrose by throwing 

 up single flowers of precisely the Primrose character, as well as 

 others possessing characters of its other parent, the Oxlip. 



As a natural consequence, such a hybrid would reproduce at times 

 both the parent species, a fact Mr. Doubleday believes to be fully 

 proved. 



The Bardfield plant, which Mr. Doubleday considers the true Ox- 

 lip, differs from the hybrid in the form of the calyx, in its drooping 

 umbel, and in its leaves dying off in autumn : he has examined thou- 

 sands of plants at and near Bardfield, and never observed a single in- 

 stance of a solitary flower being thrown up as in the hybrid. The 

 Primrose does not occur for some miles round Bardfield, though the 

 Cowslip is abundant ; therefore hybridization cannot well take place 

 in that locality. The plant under cultivation does not change its 

 character. Should it prove a distinct species, Mr. Doubleday claim- 

 ed for his brother the credit of first detecting the distinction. 



