232 Lees: The Volteface of Flora — A Rejoinder. 



I never said ' species' underwent any 'natural change ' at all! 

 Or un-natural for that matter ; though a better word than 

 ' natural ' might, perhaps, be found. I meant a change non- 

 intentional rather on the part of the initiator. The species them- 

 selves do not alter in constitution ; — natives at any rate don't, 

 the Daisy of to-day as strong, I take it, as the Daisy of Malory's 

 day ; — and their requirements are a fixed quantity, too. All 

 sorts of changes, independent of man, interfere with a plant's 

 longevity ; but what I advanced was, that where they did not 

 die out altogether, the exact locations of plants varied with 

 changing conditions, and that their former sites were occupied 

 by other species, by no means always Aliens ; and that, over 

 large areas, as one spot grew drier and another wetter, or 

 shadier, there were many singular dis- and re-appearances. 

 This is the expression of a fact that stares every field botanist 

 in the face whose outlook is upkept for a decade or two. Many 

 plants besides Lilies and Orchises are locomotive ; wind (with 

 Epilobium seed especially) — birds (with Cloudberry and other 

 fruit grains) play a great not-yet-half acknowledged part in 

 keeping up the sum-total of our flora to its norm. 



To me the continuance of Pyrola at North Dean, etc., is 

 the least explainable of Mr. Moss's facts. I suspect the 

 landslip slope on which it grows to be protected in some 

 way from further dislocation or interference. There was a 

 certain inaccessibility years ago, and an unsuitability for the 

 encroachments of industry : hill had said to intellect (as it were) 

 'Thus far, and no further.' Plants that grow in shadow are 

 not very sensitive to smoke, they dormate long, show their 

 green late like the ash, and their vulnerable period of shooting 

 into blossom is short. The tenacity of life in Pyrola rootlets is 

 amazing. Give them a well-drained tree-pot, kept atilt, as much 

 transplantation as you like, but no water-famine or sun-ray, and 

 they thrive apace. I have Pyrola media now, flowering nicely, 

 in a slanted pot on a busy roadside rockery in this smoky town 

 of Leeds. I have had both it and Campanula hederacea some 

 years. The ivy-leaved bell-flower (from Marsden), however, 

 w T ill only blossom under a bell glass. Smoke chokes that ; which 

 shows the smoke fiend not to be rampant in Cob Clough, at any 

 rate. 



I don't think Bolton 'overlooked' Epilobium roseum : it has 

 grown vastly commoner the last forty years, spreading principally 

 through the medium of market gardens and soil at the roots of 

 florists' plants. King, or one of his successors, is likely enough 



Naturalist, 



