Page:Journal of botany, British and foreign, Volume 9 (1871).djvu/262

 240 STATIONS OF, AND REMARKS ON, SOME PLYMOUTH PLANTS.

bifid ; the ' flosculi ' are the flowers, usually, as stated, teruate ; the sepals, being coloured internally, were mistaken for petals ; and the petals themselves, being less than half as long the sepals, and furnished with a foveola and gland, were described as ' nectarii foveola.' The fruit is ia reality a drupe, composed of three confluent 1-celled 1-seeded pyrense ; and it must have been imperfect examination which led Loureiro to describe it as 1-celled and 4-seeded. His account of the habit and specific characters of the plant is good. Its employment, recorded by Dr. Bn'dfiman, by the poorer Chinese as a succedaneum for tea, seems dictated by a not unwise instinct, since Endlicher observes (Enchirid. Bot. 524) : " Grewia Microcos cortice amaro-aromatico foliisque adstriu- gentibus commendatur."

It follows from the above that Jrsis nujosa, Lour., given by all writers as a synonym of Grewia Microcos, must be a different plant. To judj^e from the description, it is most likely a Grewia with exinvolucrate cyraules, belonging to the section OmpJiacarpus*

��STATIONS OP, AND REMAEKS ON, SOME PLYMOUTH

PLAiNTS.

By T. R. Archer Brigos.

Ranuncnhis avricomns, L. This is local about Plymouth, and it seems that very few stations are recorded for it across the Tamar, in Cornwall. It occurs in the east of this county, on a bank (for about twenty yards) by the Torpoint and Liskeard turnpike, close to the en- trance gate to Sconner House grounds ; also, but very sparingly, by the same road, close to the seventh milestone from Torpoint.

'Ranunculus hirsntns, Curt. Sometimes this appears only as a casual in waste spots by salt water and in arable land, but it is at least a colonist at St. John's, Cornwall, about four miles from Plymouth ; and this summer (1871) I have found it so plentiful in a marsh at the head of Denabole " Lake," a tidal inlet from the Lynher, in the same county, that I should consider it a native if there were not a flour-mill near. In May, 1868, it occurred in damp spots in a lane near a farmhouse, a little to the north-west of Battisborough Cross, as well as in a field near. The lighter hue of both its foliage and flowers renders it distinguishable from R. bulbosus and R. repens at some ilistance.

Ranunculus arve)isis, L. Very rare, and only as acasuul. Pour plants among-st wheat in tlie field opposite Antony Lodge, near Torpoint, Corn- wall, May, 1871.

Helleborus viridis, L. This is generally seeti growing in a patch or two in an orchard, or on a hedgebank by an old garden, — as at Trehan, in the parish of St. Stephen, Cornwall, where it occurs near plants of Sedum Telepkiuni., a species very frequently met with close to old farm- houses or villages, but rarely found in wilder spots. At Pill, near

appears to sustain Dr. Hance's sunnise as to the absence of an involucre. In other respects they are very similar to G. Microcos, L., slightly dift'cu-ing, however, in being more glabrous, having fewer- flowered panicles and smaller leaves. tJnfor- tunately there is no specimen of Fallopia among Loureiro's plants. — H. T.
 * An examination of Loureiro's specimens of Arsis in the British Museum

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