NOTES. 
PKOLONGED VITALITY OP THE SEEDS OP SEA- 
SHOEE PLANTS. — Although it has long been well known that 
the seeds of many sea-shore plants retain their germinating power 
after long immersion in sea-water, there are few exact observations 
on record. Dr. H. B. Guppy, who spent some months in the Keeling 
Islands (the scene of some of Darwin’s earliest work), and specially 
investigated the flora with reference to the germination and growth of 
seeds cast ashore by the waves, brought home seeds of many of the 
plants for further experiment. Some interesting results have been 
obtained. About the middle of last June he sent to Kew a germinat- 
ing seed of Thespesia populnea. This was collected fresh in the 
Keeling Islands in October, 1888, and kept dry until June 8th, 1890, 
when it was placed in sea-water, where it remained floating until June 
8th, 1891. It was then subjected to conditions favourable to germ- 
ination, and in less than a fortnight it began to sprout, and it is now 
growing at Kew. On the 15th of July Dr. Guppy sent a germinating 
seed of Ipomoea grandijiora, collected in the same islands in No- 
vember, 1888, and subjected to the same treatment subsequently as 
the seed of Thespesia , with the only difference that it was five weeks 
before it germinated. 
Of course these tw^o instances merely confirm what was assumed 
before, namely, that the seeds of many of the plants found in remote 
islands must be able to endure long immersion in sea-water without 
injury ; yet they are none the less interesting. 
Both are ornamental plants — the Thespesia being a small tree and 
the Ipomoea a climber or trailer. Both have densely hairy seeds. 
The trigonous seeds of the latter are about a third of an inch long, and 
are furnished with an additional fringe of long hairs around the longer 
circumference, so that when they float, in still water at least, this 
fringe rests on the surface. Both have an exceedingly wide range 
of distribution, partly due, doubtless, to human agency on account of 
their ornamental character ; but also largely due to their capacity for 
colonisation from seeds cast ashore by the sea. Both occur on remote 
