220 
HISTORY OK THE COUNTY BOTANY OF WORCESTER. 
do we not take more advantage of it ? Many of us could 
manage a birds’-nesting trip, or a plant or insect hunting 
trip, or a foreign geological tour of a few days to Holland, or 
France, or Spain, or Switzerland, under the wing and auspices 
of Mr. Cook and his brethren. But, I think, you will agree 
with me that it is an exceptional circumstance for English 
naturalists to do so. When we English do go abroad it is, 
as a rule, to rush, guide-book in hand, through a given 
number of cities, like a whirlwind ; or to pound resolutely 
along a lot of dusty highroads on a bicycle, happy if we can 
do our fixed number of kilometres in the day—robbed of all 
interest in our dinner if we fall short of the allotted distance 
—bringing back with us no very definite idea, save that we 
have “ done ” so many towns or miles in so many hours. Is 
not this a legitimate caricature of the British tourist ? But 
could not we naturalists—at Whitsuntide, for instance—get 
a few days in a new field, with a trusty companion, and add 
to our storehouse of facts and observations, or even to our 
cabinets, experiences which might be a valuable possession to 
us for the whole of our natural lives. 
But why do we so often prefer to, what I must call, waste 
a fortnight or three weeks at home, in some semi-fashionable 
sea-side town or inland watering-place—doing nothing what¬ 
ever, and trying to fancy we like it—paying dear for ill-cooked 
meals in stuffy lodgings or a racketty hotel —when the same 
expenditure would have given us (unless our number of olive 
branches is abnormally large) a far more delightful and 
equally health-giving tour in Norway or Italy, from which we 
might have returned with, for example, a whole bale of dried 
plants, enough to occupy, with absorbing interest, all our 
unemployed evenings through the next winter, and forming a 
valuable item in our collection of reference ? 
(To be continued.) 
HISTORY OF THE COUNTY BOTANY OF WORCESTER. 
BY WM. MATHEWS, M. A. 
Edwin Lees in Hast. “III. Nat. His. Worc.,” cotitinued. 
(Continued from page 207.) 
* Iris foetidissinia, 150. Near Alfrick, and at the western base of 
Crookbarrow Hill. Also about Persliore, in woody places. 
S.G. 
* Crocus vernus, 150. Very rare. Several plants were found a few 
years ago in the middle of a meadow between Worcester and 
Crookbarrow Hill, by Mr. James Goodman, who pointed them 
out to Mr. Lees. L.M. 
