Occasional Notes. 
limestone has been confirmed after careful investigation. The 
existence of Heather on limestone referred to in the earlier survey 
of the Pennines, is further established in Mr. Moss’s areas, con¬ 
siderable tracts occurring on the plateaux both in Derby and 
Somerset. Mr. Rankin (Portsmouth), in a communication, reported 
Heather on limestone on the borders of Yorkshire and 
Westmoreland, and submitted photographs showing Calluua and 
Sesleria ccerulea growing together on a limestone heath. 
Mr. A. G. Tansley, dealing with features of heath-associations 
of the Lower Greensand, introduced some methods of recording 
which have not yet been utilised in the moorland surveys. The 
reconstitution of a heath vegetation on places cleared by man was 
shown by an interesting series of quadrat charts. The intrusion of 
Gorse and Grasses into a Calluna-Erica-Pteris vegetation was also 
traced. A general discussion of the probable origin and relation¬ 
ships of the different types of Lower Greensand vegetation was 
also given. 
Professor F. W. Oliver gave an example of his ecological 
studies on a salt-marsh in Brittany. The well-defined limits of 
certain plant associations has led to a careful periodic examination 
of the growth of annual species. It has been found that although 
seedlings come up almost uniformly amongst the open vegetation, 
a process of sorting-out ensues, seedlings dying off under certain 
conditions of soil-moisture and salinity, while they flourish under 
other conditions. 
These communications will give some idea of the scope of the 
work of the Committee. It will, we believe, be admitted that they 
mark an advance towards the elucidation of problems of which 
even the simplest are not easy to solve. The effect of organisation 
is to stimulate and to suggest wider outlooks, while at the same 
time it prevents overlapping of effort and secures that no part of 
the field of ecology is neglected. The number of members on the 
Committee is small, but these represent several spheres of work, 
and are distributed over the whole of Britain. The limited size of 
this body of workers has many advantages since each one has a 
direct influence on the work in hand. It is at present a question 
for the Committee, how far it might be extended into a wider 
organisation without lessening efficiency. W.G.S. 
OCCASIONAL NOTES. 
VERY pleasant function took place in the Physiological 
A Laboratory of the new Botany School at Cambridge on 
Saturday, October 28th, when a fine portrait of Mr. Francis 
Darwin, painted by Mr. Rothenstein, was presented to the 
Botanical Department of the University by Mr. Darwin’s old 
pupils. At the same time a beautifully bound collection of the 
autographs of the donors was given to Mr. Darwin. 
The occasion of the painting of the picture was Mr. Darwin’s 
retirement from the Readership in Botany last year. It occurred 
to some of his old pupils that the event could not be allowed to 
pass without some expression of the admiration and affection 
universally felt for their old teacher. It was decided that the most 
appropriate form this feeling could take would be to ask 
Mr. Darwin to sit for a portrait-drawing to be presented to the 
University Laboratory. Mr. Rothenstein, who undertook the 
commission, preferred to paint an oil portrait and generously offered 
