314 
THE JOURNAL OF EOTANY 
SHORT NOTES. 
Arum italicum in Sussex. When staying at Worthing in the 
spring of 1921, I attempted to discover this plant in the localities to 
the north of that town near Broadwater and Offington, mentioned in 
Arnold’s Sussex Flora , hut succeeded only in finding the yellow- 
spadixed variety of A. maculatum (var. Tetrelii Corb.). There is, 
however, a specimen in Mr. T. A. Ttymes’s herbarium from Broad¬ 
water, collected in 1881 by Mrs. B. M. Oakeshott, which is probably 
the true plant; the example is fastened down to the sheet and not 
easily examined. In exploring the country west of Worthing in the 
same quest, 1 came across a fine clump of leaves near Goring which 
seemed undoubtedly those of A. italicum ; unfortunately I was too 
early for the flowers. This year (1923) my friend Mr. H. S. Salt 
has sent me fine flowers from the same spot gathered in May. A. 
italicum flowers considerably later than A. maculatum ; Mrs. Oake- 
shott’s Broadwater example is labelled “ July.” Mr. Salt has also 
discovered a fresh station for the plant near Arundel, from which 
neighbourhood its occurrence was reported in this Journal for 1920, 
p. 274.— C. E. Salmon. 
Callitriciie truncata Guss. This species, so rare in Britain 
was added to the flora of S. Somerset, v.c. 5, in 1907 (Journ. Bot’ 
1908, 255), when Marshall got it in good quantity, but without fruit' 
at Chard Reservoir. It was subsequently found “fine and plentiful ’’ 
in the Bridgwater and Taunton Canal. On August 9th this year 1 
got it in v.c. 6, “ N. Somerset,” viz. in an old peat-digging on a 
small enclosure of peat near Glastonbury and Street. Thanks chiefly 
to Mr. A. G. Tansley’s generosity and encouragement, this field, now 
called the “ Sharpham Moor Plot,” is being bought on behalf of 
some 33 subscribers in order to keep it for experimental purposes and 
to save the rare Carex evoluta from destruction. It will be managed 
by a Bristol and Somerset Committee, and probably vested in the 
Society for the Promotion of Nature Reserves ; donations towards 
its upkeep will be gratefully received and acknowledged by the 
writer. When Mr. Tansley and I visited the plot on June 24 we 
listed about a hundred vascular plants on the varied surface. My 
peat-moor specimens of the Callitriciie have no fruit, but Mr. J. W. 
White confirms the determination. C. autumnalis, which is not 
recorded from Somerset, is apparently the nearest ally.—H. Stuart 
Thompson. 
REVIEWS. 
Fractical Plant Ecology, a Guide for Beginners in Field Stud// 
of Plant Communities. By A. G. Tansley, M.A., F.R.S., 
Pp. 228. Price 7s. 6d. net. London : George Unwin and 
Unwin Ltd. 
The study of ecology as a special branch of botany may still be 
said to be in its infancy—so much so that the legitimate aims of the 
subject as such are even now much misunderstood. It is difficult to 
define ecology without seeming to encroach beyond the set limits of 
other branches of botanv, but in this it differs onlv in decree from 
