SHOUT NOTES AND QUERIES. 17
SCLERODERMA GEASTER. — I see Dr. Bull is said to have first found this when on the "foray" in October last, but I found it several weeks before, and being unable to make it agree with any species in our English books, I took it down to the Hereford Meeting, and called Mr. Worthing- ton Smith's attention to the fact of its changing to a dark brown colour when cut, a peculiarity not mentioned as pertaining to any English species hitherto described. I have several now growing in my garden, but only one bursts in the Geaster-like manner. — W. Phillips.
Protandry in Butomus umbellatus, L. — During the summer of 1869 I observed this plant rather closely, and found that the pollen was discharged from the anthers before the stigmas became receptive. The stamens are somewhat erect before the discharge of the pollen, but afterwards fall back upon the perianth. A small globule of rather viscid, sweetish fluid appears between each carpel, and may probably attract insects for purposes either of cross- or of self-feryilization. — James Britten.
Cuscuta Hassiaca, Pfeiff. — It may be well to place on record that Mr. John Dovaston, of Westfelton, Shropshire, sent me this plant, which he found growing this summer at Wigmarsh, near that place. It bids fair to become naturalized in England. — W. A. Leighton.
Monstrous Growth in a Cauliflower.— A short time ago I received a cauliflower plant, of which the heart had been completely eaten out by the larvte of the stag-beetle, which infested the garden where it grew. The injury had taken place when the plant was quite young, so that the scar was healed up; but, as is often the case when plants of the cabbage tribe have been similarly injured, all further growth seemed to have been arrested ; and although the lower leaves remained green and healthy, there were no sprouts formed in their axils, nor any new shoots from the crown of the root. When the plant was pulled up, however, a strange abnormal growth was found to have taken place in the root. An immense number of buds had been produced from the lower part of the collar, and from the axils of many of the larger rootlets ; and these had pushed their way, not up into the air, as might have been expected, but downwards into the soil, forming a dense mass of underground shoots, bearing rudimentary leaves, and which, after penetrating the soil a short distance, began to turn upwards.— Robert Holland.
Thlaspi perfoliatum, L. — This interesting plant is somewhat uncertain in its occurrence in its localities, and seems to prefer broken limestone not too much disintegrated. Mr. H. Boswell found it, however, on cultivated ground near Woodstock, but on visiting the place with him another year we did not detect a single specimen. In 1869 I met with it very plentifully on the bare sides of the embankment, and even on the ballast between the rails, of the Great Western Railway from the Tetbury Road Station for about a mile towards Hayley Wood. A patch of very fine individuals occurred on a roadside bank close to the village of Sapperton. The Sapperton tunnel locality, first, I believe, given by Professor Buckmann, I did not verify ; it is somewhat ambiguous, as there are two tunnels at Sapperton, the lower one carrying the Thames and Severn Canal over the watershed of the two rivers. Dr. St. Brody, who visited the place with me, thought that a spoil heap over one of the shafts of the tunnel was the original locality, but we failed to find the plant there.— W. T. Thiselton Dyer.
vol. IX. [JANUARY 1, 1871.] C
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