THE ESSEX NATURALIST. 
Viola hivta. “ Never saw this wild—doubt its being found here. 
This may be erased." Later, however, Forster himself records this plant 
“ in flower, in a held on the right-hand side of the Lane leading from Hale- 
end to Chingford Hatch, opposite the Larks, several plants, 16 April 
1826." 
Solidago virgaurea. “ Suspect this an error." 
Myrica gale . " Planted no doubt.” 
Convallavia multiflora {Polygonalum multiflorum]. “ Planted probably 
or escaped from some garden." 
Against the printed record of Polypodium fragile [since re¬ 
cognised as being Cystopteris alpina, Desv.], growing “ in a wall 
before Mr. Story’s house, in the lane leading from the Lea Bridge 
Road to Leyton Church,” Forster comments : “ This is tho 1 
not to be P. fragile. See English Botany No. [163] under the 
name of Cyathea incisa, taken from specimens from the Wall 
mentioned.” He notes “ several specimens 1787, D° 1794.” 
and “ Many plants on the wall both sides the gate 8th Aug 1 
1814.” (Plate VII.) 
This last record deserves further comment, on account of 
its unique character. The Alpine Bladder Fern was admitted 
into the British flora on the strength of its occurrence on the 
wall at Leyton and nowhere else in these islands. Sir W. J. 
Hooker records (in his “ British Ferns,” 1861, where he gives a 
plate [Plate 24] of the species) that Edward Forster took him 
early in the 19th century to see the plant growing in its one 
station, and confirms its identification as C. alpina and notes 
that it was “ apparently wild ” ; but at the same time gives as 
his verdict “ there is too much reason to suspect that it had been 
planted.” Gibson in his “ Flora of Essex,” 1862, remarks in his 
preface : “ Cystopteris alpina has been admitted into the British 
Floras from an Essex station, but it has no claim to be reckoned 
a native plant ” : and elsewhere (p. 398), he states that “ a MS. 
note, apparently written by T. F. Forster about 1778, in the 
“ Plantae Woodfordienses,” is the earliest known notice of it.” 
The MS. note referred to is of course one afterwards printed in T. 
F. Forster’s “ Additions to Warner’s ‘ Plantae Woodfordienses’ ” 
of 1784, and cannot be the MS. notes of Benjamin Forster which 
we are now considering, and which are, of course, subsequent 
to the publication of the “ Additions.” Before Gibson’s time 
the wall at Leyton had been demolished and the one habitat 
