19<J5 pRAiiGiiR. — Tlie Flora of the Mullet and Inislikca. 231 



Mr. More was frequently in Erris in the seventies, but was 

 chiefly eugaged in dredging and shooting, and the time spent 

 oil shore was short.^ The only trace of his visits that the 

 botanical records alBford is a note of Jujicus obtusiflorus, from 

 sands near Belmullet {Cybele^ ed. ii.) 



A record in Cybele, ed. ii. of Erica mediterra^iea from near 

 Belmullet in the name of H. C. Hart, dated 1887, leads one to 

 conclude that that botanist penetrated to this, as to most other 

 remote corners of our island, but this note appears to be 

 his sole published observation from western Erris. 

 - My own only previous experience of Krris rests on a brief 

 scamper over the bleak hills which fringe Broad Haven at 

 4 o'clock on a June morning in 1896, till the horn of the 

 " Granuaile " summoned us aboard again. On that occasion I 

 met with no plant of interest. 



Of the flora of the several islands lying off the Erris coast? 

 not as much as a single note appears to have been published ; 

 and indeed, the ill-fated visit of A. G. More to Inishkea in 

 1873 is the only record we have of a botanist having landed on 

 these remote islands. 



I^ast July ni}^ wife and I sailed from Achill to Inishkea, and 

 spent a day and a half in exploring the north and south 

 islands ; thence to Belmullet, where five days were spent on 

 the Mullet and one about Carrowmore L,ake ; and thence by 

 steamer along the grand cliff scenery of nortli Maj'o to Sligo. 

 In the present paper I shall endeavour to sketch the botany 

 of the Mullet and Inishkea. 



The MUI.1.KT. 



The Mullet is an almost insular area. Broad Haven on the 

 north, and Blacksod Bay on the south, approaching each other 

 to within 300 yards at the town of Belmullet. Through the 

 intervening neck a sea canal has been cut. The area, 

 embracing about 45 square miles, thus isolated, divides itself 

 into two parts of different physical aspect. The portion south 

 of Belmullet consists of a long narrow promontory, some ten 

 miles in length by one to two miles in width, of low elevation 

 save in the extreme south, where a group of bare hills rise to 



1 More's " Life and Letters," chaps. 34-36. 1898. 



