M. Benson. 
354 
BOTRYCHIUM LJJNARIA WITH TWO FERTILE LOBES. 
[Text-Fig. 46.] 
T HIS summer on one of the old 
moraines at Arolla, Canton Valais, 
Switzerland, I found a specimen of 
Botrychium lunaria with duplicate fertile 
lohes on the frond (Text-fig. 46). 
As far as I know such a specimen 
has not been recorded before, although 
it is not uncommon for the usually sterile 
part of the frond to bear sporangia. 
The present shoot is analagous with the 
normal condition of Ophiog. palmatum 
and seemed worthy of record owing to 
the limited and isolated character of 
family. 
M. BENSON. 
VEGETATION AND FROST. 
Ah, bitter chill it was! 
The owl, for all his feathers was a-cold; 
The hare limp’d trembling through the frozen grass ; 
And silent was the flock in woolly fold : 
rnHE contrast between the effects of external cold upon the two 
1 kingdoms of living things suggested in this shivering picture 
is a characteristic one. The animal suffers the sensation of cold, but 
protects itself from actually freezing by greater heat-producing 
metabolism, within non-conducting coverings; while the plant, 
which has no such adaptations, cools down pari passu with the 
environment, and freezes solid. 
In our comfortable conviction that the plant, in so doing, suffers 
no agony of cold we may reserve our sympathies for our nearer 
brethren, but it will be a not unseasonable enquiry to consider in-a 
general way the relation of plant-vitality to such low temperatures 
as occur normally in the winter months. 
