63 



IRIS SPURIA: 



A LINCOLNSHIRE ESCAPE. 



F. M. BURTON. F.L.S., F.G.S., 



Highfield, Gainsborough, Lincolnshire. 



Four years ago, while at Sutton, on the Lincolnshire coast, 

 I received from my friend, the Rev. W. T. Jennings, Vicar of 

 Huttoft, the flowers of an Iris, which he said he had seen 

 growing in considerable quantity in the marshes adjoining the 

 coast, and which he said were annually gathered by children for 

 their school feast. I went over soon after to the place and 

 found the Iris growing on ditch sides with the ordinary Yellow 

 Flag, Iris pseud-acorus , and, though it was somewhat late in 

 the year for the flowers, and they had been mostly gathered by 

 the children a week or two before, I found some in places where 

 they were difficult to reach ; while from one of the plants 

 I. managed to hack off a piece with some pretensions to a root 

 on it, and planted it afterwards in my garden (which is 

 a sanctuary for many a rare British plant, as it is for numerous 

 other perennials and Alpines), where it grew and prospered. 



When I first received the flowers from Mr. Jennings I sent 

 some of them to the Hon. Sec. of the Lincolnshire Naturalists' 

 Union, who forwarded them to a great and well-known 

 authority for identification ; but, whether the specimens sent had 

 lost their character by keeping, or for some other reason were 

 not easily distinguishable, I know not, the fact remains that 

 lie named it Iris fcetidissima. Last year my plant flowered and 

 I sent a spike up to Kew, and, in a day or two, received the 

 usual courteous form signed by the Director, W. T. Thiselton- 

 Dyer, with the name 'Iris spuria var. ' noted on it. This year 

 my plant failed to flower, probably owing to my having moved 

 it the . year before, so I wrote to my friend at Huttoft again 

 asking him to procure more flowers for me, which he very 

 kindly did, and I sent them up to Sir Michael Foster, whose 

 interest in Irises is well known, and whose knowledge of them 

 is shown by his able monograph on ' Bulbous Irises,' published 

 by the Royal Horticultural Society. In a few days I received 

 his reply, and as it is of much interest I quote it in full : 



'July i, Nine Wells, Great She'Ifbrdj Cambridge. 



'Dear Sir, — 'Owing to the Iris being sent to Trinity College 

 (instead of my private address) there has been some delay in 

 its coming into my hands. It is undoubtedly one of the many 

 forms of I. spuria. There are two or three European forms and 

 1900 February 1. 



