Page:Journal of botany, British and foreign, Volume 9 (1871).djvu/198

 170 SHOKT NOTES AND QUERIES.

appears to have been hoed. To-day I saw a waggon load of Charlock an acre, where Turnips were doubtless intended ; and yesterday not a less burden of the common Bugloss {Lycopsis arvensis)." 1 now pass on to the ' Delineator, or a Picturesque, Historical, and Topographical Descrip- tion of the Isle of Wight,' by James Clarke (2nd edition, 1814; 6th edition, 1824). In this we have, "The Bee and Fly Orchis are found near Carisbrooke Castle and several other places in the island" (2nd edition, p. 77; 6th edition, p. 68); also, "there are several at Sir William Fitz- william Barrington's, Bart., Swainston." The Digitalis and Eock- samphire are also mentioned in both editions. Englefield's ' Isle of Wight' (1816) is mostly concerned with the geological aspect of the island, but on p. 53 he writes: — " The observation of the sudden changes of the whn^e look of the vegetation, correspondent to the changes of the subsoil, which Dr. Maton, in his ' Western Tour,' mentions with the de- tail of an experienced botanist, had occurred to me constantly in my different tours in the island, and had guided me in a very instructive manner as to the succession and limits of the different subsoils, where no openings of the ground were to be found to aid research. The geologist would do wtll to pay constant attention to such indicaiions ; and there is something peculiarly pleasing in seeing sciences not apparently related thus mutually tending to the advancement of both. How false and con- temptible is the supercilious pride of liira who dares despise even the most apparently trifling observation on, or humble investigation of, the great and infinitely varied spectacle of nature!" My last quotation con- sists of the last sentence in the description of the Isle of Wight by Eobert Mudie, Hampshire (vol. iii. I. of W. p. 226), 1838 :— " The botany and zoology of the Isle of Wight present nothing peculiar." I have not been able to consult J. Albin's ' Isle of Wight Magazine ' (1799) ; W. Cooke's 'Picture of the Isle of Wight' (1813);^nor John Stnrch's 'Isle of Wight' (1791). In conclusion, I hope to make some further remarks on the modern condition of the flora, when Mr. A. G. More's valuable paper has been completed. — R. Tucker.

Luminous Fungi.- — Two years ago I had some specimens of luminous fungi sent to me from the Cardiff coal-mines ; they were parasitic on the shoring timbers, and both fungi and mycelium were phosphorescent. The colliers in the coal-mines of the western boundary of Glamorganshire and adjoining Caermarthenshire are well acquainted with these phosphorescent fungi, and the men state that they give sufficient light to " see their hands by." In another coal-mine, seven miles north of Cardiff, some colliers told Mr. William Adams that they had seen lights on the timber when travelling in tlie dark, and one of them said he was much frightened the first time he saw them. The luminous fungi sent to me from these mines were specimens of Folyporus annonus, Fr., and they could be seen in the dark at a distance of twenty yards. I have also seen P. snlfnreus, Fr., phosphorescent, and Mr. Broome has met with a luminous Corticium. I have heard that C. cfendeuni, Fr., is sometimes luminous. Berkeley says that Ayaricna (Crepicfotus) olearius, Fr., a para'-ite of Olive-trees, is some- times so luminous in the south of France that letters may be distinginshed by its light. A short time since I had a dried Agaric (probably a Collybia) given me through Professor Ciiurch, of Cirencester, which was phosphorescent when gathered ; it came from a cellar in Oxford Street.

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