29 



REVIEWS AND BOOK NOTICES. 



The Flora of West Lancashire, bv J. A. Wheldon, F.L.S., and 

 Albert Wilson, F.L.S., F.R. Met. Soc. Published by the authors, 1907. 

 511 pp., 15 plates and coloured map, 12/6. 



The publication of the present volume is welcomed in that it takes awa}:~ 

 the reproach from the botanical science of half Lancashire, that despite the 

 interesting character of the varied plant associations and the long- and 

 honoured roll of field workers, it gives for the first time an ordered account 

 and adequate list of the plants and their stations. Westmorland and South 

 Lancashire alone of the northern areas remain without a sufficient floristic 

 account. 



The area monographed is Watson's \"ice-County No. 60, and is bounded 

 on the north by an irregular line from Arnside on the coast to the County 

 Stone on the ridge of Greygarth, on the south by the Ribble, on the east by 

 the high watershed of Rowland and the Hodder, and on the west by a long 

 and indented coastline. Though in Lancashire there is little of the county 

 of popular experience and imagination in the remote and wooded dales cut- 

 ting deep and high into the wild grouse moors of Abbeystead and Littledale, 

 the pleasant foot-hills and richly cultivated lowlands of Lonsdale and 

 Wyresdale, where the smoke cloud of the industrial coal-field does not 

 obscure the sun and cast continual gloom. Beyond the pleasant and varied 

 prospect of the area as seen from some such height as Wards Stone, to the 

 botanist there is further interest ; for within the four quarters of the area, 

 many rare species of interesting character find suitable habitats. On the 

 ridge of Greygarth there is an approach to the sub-arctic heath, in the 

 presence of Sa/i'.v herbacea. The broad fell sides are, for square miles, cov- 

 ered by deep deposits of peat, above which dominate the varied associations 

 of the moor, the Sphagnum, Eriophorum, Eriophorum with Calluna, and the 

 Calluna moors. Here Cloudberry finds its life conditions well satisfied. 

 Drier fell-edges are dominated by Calluna and grass heaths, in some places 

 of exceptional interest. The numerous gills are wooded with oak and ash 

 and festooned by ferns. About Silverdale and Burton, as also about the 

 gills of Leek Fell, are bared pavements or swallow holes, the homes of the 

 richly varied species of the associations of the limestone. The Lowlands 

 have interest in the numerous relics of the once extensive peat mosses, 

 which frequently show plainly the succession from the swamp to the heath 

 moor. The littoral associations are of interest, alike the scanty outcrops of 

 hard rock and the extensive salt marshes about the shores of Morecambe 

 Bay and the estuaries of the Lune and Wyre. 



\\\ such a district the authors have laboured for years, as leisure froni 

 business allowed, and the present volume is the result. It is evident from 

 a perusal of the floristic part of the book how many gaps in our knowledge 

 of the existence and distribution of plant species they have filled. But the 

 book is more than a compilation of the names and stations of the Sperma- 

 phyta, Pteridophyta, Bryophyta, and Lichens, as will be understood from 

 the discussion of the topography and meteorology, the climate and edaphic 

 factors as they effect the distribution of plants, \\\ this illuminating preface 

 of 127 pages the authors have conceived their duty intelligently as one to 

 make plain to students and field workers what kinds of plant grouping obtain, 

 and within self-imposed limits of space and procedure have produced a 

 memoir which has a place not sub-ordinate to the list. An interesting 

 meteorological section brings out the observation that the vegetation is 

 generally from a week to a fortnight earlier than in Yorkshire, this advance, 

 however, being checked and the lagging begun in July. In a brief dis- 

 cussion of the plant distribution as affected by the edaphic characters of the 

 station, the conditions of life of the various associations are passed under 

 review according to the systems of Warming, Schimper, and British plant 

 geographers. The woodlands of the area, however, are meagrely dealt 

 with. It is noted that Pteris may adapt itself to limestone soil as Calluna 

 would appear to do in Westmorland, Somerset, and Yorkshire. Juniper 

 may be seen growing on the shales and grits in Upper Hindburndale, amidst 



1908 January i. 



