Parsons : Maritime Plants and Tidal Riyers. 115 



are no kinds of maritime plants that are not to be found in the waste 

 ground by the Hookroad at Goole, near the end of Marshfield 

 Terrace, in which spot almost all the species that I have mentioned 

 may be seen growing. 



A characteristic feature of sea-side plants which becomes more and 

 more marked as we proceed toward the mouth of the Ouse, is the 

 succulence of the foliage ; this is a matter of habitat rather than of 

 kind, for many plants which when growing inland have membranous 

 leaves, become fleshy when growing on the sea shore. Plantago 

 maritima and Glaiix maritima, which at Goole are rank and weedy in 

 habit, at the mouth of the Ouse near Ousefleet become dwarf and 

 succulent. The succulence depends upon the amount of salt present 

 in the soil ; if the water absorbed by the rootlets and carried up to 

 the leaves be charged with salt, endosmosis is promoted, and evapora- 

 tion is checked ; and hence the tissues of the plant are distended 

 with fluid. 



The common plants of the sea shore which are not found here, are 

 perhaps worth a few remarks. Of course we do not expect to find on 

 the banks of our muddy estuaries the plants of rocky or sandy shores, 

 as the samphire, the horned poppy, and the sand sedge j but it is 

 strange that we do not get the sea-thrift (^Armeria maritima) and the 

 sea arrowgrass [Triglochin maritimum), for which I have looked care- 

 fully in vain, although one would have thought that our shores would 

 have afforded them many a congenial home. None of the fleshy 

 marine Chenopodiaceoe, SaUola, Suceda^ Salicornia &c., are found here, 

 doubtless because there is not salt enough to please their taste ; but 

 their landsman cousin Atriplex Jiastata near the Ouse mouth is very 

 abundant and succulent, putting on a puzzling variety of forms. 



Besides the flowering plants of maritime type which are truly 

 native here, certain others worth mentioning are met with. On ballast 

 at Goole, brought by sea-going vessels, I have found Carduus tenui- 

 florus and Atriplex littoralis^ together with several plants which are not 

 native in Britain ; these can take no higher rank in our local flora 

 than that of casuals. 



The well-known grass-like sea-weed, EnteromorpTia intestinalis, is 

 very abundant on stones in the Ouse ; it is, however, by no means 

 exclusively a salt-water plant, as it is found plentifully in non-tidal 

 ditches in the Marshland district, and indeed is sometimes met with 

 far inland, and much above the sea-level. The variety which grows 

 in the river is very different in appearance from that in the ditches, 

 being dwarfer, more tufted, deeper green, and less inflated. 



