21 



AT A MEETING OF THE SOCIETY 



HELD ON 



WEDNESDAY, 26th NOVEMBER, 1902, 

 Mr. A. D. WEBSTER, F.R.S.E., 



READ A PAPER ON 



"THE EXTERMINATION OF BRITISH PLANTS, 

 WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO BLACKHEATH 

 AND GREENWICH. ' 



For many years past I have, as far as possible, kept a 

 record of such plants as, from their extreme rarity, are likely 

 to become lost to our flora, and sorry am I to say that the 

 list continues to lengthen. 



For such examples we do not require to go far from 

 home, as, on Blackheath, one of the healthiest colonies of the 

 rare Autumn Squill (S cilia autumnalis), which in Britain is 

 confined to a few of the Southern English Counties, has 

 almost, if not entirely, disappeared from the Heath. 



Whether the extremely rare Marsh Sow Thistle (Sonchus 

 palustris) is now to be found on the Plumstead Marshes, 

 the Deptford Pink (Dianthus armeria) in Charlton Wood, the 

 wild Tulip (Tulipa sylvestris) at Chislehurst, or the Spring 

 Potentill (Potentilla verna) at Wickham, is not known ; most 

 likely not, for repeated searches have been unsuccessful, and 

 enquiries have elicited no satisfactory information. 



The progress of drainage is fast killing out the Summer 

 Snowflake (leucojum cestivum) on the Thames bank at Wool- 

 wich, while the extremely rare Quaking-grass (Briza minor), 

 has probably become extinct in the field at Burnt x\sh Lane, 

 where it survived as late as 1858. Fifty years ago, Isatis 



