BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON. 
31 
MARCH 16th. 
J. E. Gray, Esq., F.R.S., President in the Chair. 
Mr. John Reynolds made some remarks on the Chinese 
plants described in Kirscher’s History of China. The first 
alluded to was the China Rose , which is stated to have the 
peculiar property of changing colour twice a-day, from 
purple to white, from the loss of some peculiar ammoniacal 
principle. 
The second mentioned was a plant analogous to Sago, 
possessing a farinaceous pulp, extensively employed as an 
article of food in those regions, and known to the natives by 
the name of Quang lang. A third, Clavaria, was noticed, 
and which was stated to grow only on insects. 
Several others possessing singular and peculiar properties, 
as described by Kirscher, were described. 
Mr. R. Leylands of Halifax, Yorkshire, forwarded to the 
Society specimens of a Moss, new to Britain, called Cincli- 
diurn stygium discovered on a moor near Maltham Tarn, in 
Yorkshire, by Mr. John Nowell, of Halifax, who had paid 
particular attention to the lower tribes of plants. The Pre- 
sident then instanced several examples in which specimens 
were often forwarded to the British Museum to be named, 
collected by persons in humble life in various parts of this 
country. 
APRIL 6th. 
J. E. Gray, Esq., F.R.S., President, in the Chair. 
Mr. W. M. Chatterley read a translation of M. Alphonse 
Decandolle’s dissertation on the Geographical distribution of 
the plants used as food, confining himself more particularly 
to the theoretical and statistical portion of the subject. The 
paper was extracted from the fifth number of “ La Biblio- 
theque Universelle de Geneve,” for April and May, 1836 .* 
Dr. Bossey exhibited a specimen of Potentilla supina found 
by him near Woolwich, Kent. 
* The translation appeared in the Magazine of Popular Science, Vol. 4, 1837. 
