400 THE BOTANICAL EXCHANGE CLUB OF THE BRITISH ISLES. 
« 
from Mr. Bennett’s note in ‘Journal of Botany ’ 1894, p. 114, that 
the correct name for this variety is ( wibigua , Fries (‘ Mant.’ 3. p. 77). 
-J. G. 
Cardamine palustris , Petermann. Binsey meadows, Berks, May, 
1893. Dr A. von Kerner and Dr. Wettstein agree in accepting the 
above naming. It may be remembered, in the ‘ Schedm ad Floram 
Exsiccatam Austro-Hungaricam ’ iii. p. 73 (1884), that Kerner points 
out that “ the C. pratensis of ‘ Flora Danica’ fasc. xvii. t. 1039 (1790), 
and C. pratensis in Swartz ‘ Svensk Botanik,’ t. 350, mean a plant in 
which the radical leaves have from five to eight pairs of sessile leaf- 
lets which are rounded at the base but not cordately emarginate. 
C. pratensis, in Sm. ‘ Eng. Bot.’ tab. 776 (1800), is a plant with pinnate 
radical leaves with three pairs of distinctly stalked cordate leaflets. 
Petermann (‘ Deutschland Flora,’ p. 32 (1849), was the first who dis- 
tinguished the plant figured by Smith in E. B. (and reproduced by 
Syme in E. B. vol. i. pi. 109), which has flowers which are usually 
lilac, while the plant of the ‘ FI. Danica ’ are usually white. Petermann 
gave the name of C. palustris to his plant which is of more frequent 
occurrence in western and southern Europe than the true C. pratensis , 
but it occurs with it here and there. The geographical distribution of 
these two Cardamines and their nearest aided species, as far as it is at 
present known, present the following interesting conditions — C. 
pratensis, L. occupies the largest area, spreading from Labrador and 
Lapland through the whole of the north of Europe and being the only 
species of the genus. Further southwards in western and central 
Europe it is associated with C. palustris , Peterm, becoming less 
common, and being at last superseded by it.” When I read the 
above interesting account of the two plants, I thought it would be 
well to examine the British specimens in the light of Kerner’s state- 
ments My friend Mr. Knox, of Forfar, sent me a considerable 
gathering from the neighbourhood of that town, but these proved to 
be only C. palustris, which is the common plant of Oxon, Berks and 
Northamptonshire, and probably of England generally, and which I 
have collected as far north as Glen Spean in Westerness. In fact, I 
examined many hundreds of plants in many parts of Britain before I 
came across the true C. pratensis, which I saw in small quantity in 
Cothill moor, Berks, since then I have gathered it in Western Ross, 
and a specimen from near Tynehead, gathered by Prof. Bayley Balfour, 
and preserved in Herb. Oxon, is probably the same plant. Kerner 
and Wettstein, to whom I submitted the Forfar plants, said that they 
consider them to be C. palustris but with the leaflets of the radical 
leaves not so distinctly cordate as usual. Our Berks and Oxon plants 
have them distinctly cordate. My experience, limited though it may 
be, goes to show that these characters are not sufficiently permanent 
to warrant specific rank. In fact, a large series of specimens will show 
that a plant with three pairs of leaflets may, or may not, have them 
cordate, or may, or may not, have them sessile, while the flowers in 
each series may be white or lilac. I believe that British botanists, 
who may not already have seen Kerner’s paper, will thank my friend 
Mr. Garnsey for kindly translating the above note which I have 
