168
MUSEUM NOTES.
"Varenne did not keep his Essex plants distinct; they were inserted in
their proper places amongst others in his herbarium, nor did he trouble to
preserve an Essex specimen if he had a sufficiently characteristic one from
elsewhere. The great value of his collection of flowering plants consisted—
not in its completeness as a county collection, nor even in the number of his
own personal gatherings—but in the authentically named critical species
which he had received from British specialists. Although an excellent
'all-round' botanist, Varenne had a special liking for the cryptogams rather
than phanerogams, and nearly all the specimens in his collection of the
former were gathered by him."
The Varenne Cryptogamic Herbarium, thus rescued from
further destruction, consists of the following, in round numbers :—
350 Mosses 450 Lichens
150 Hepaticae 100 Sea-weeds
200 Fungi (Leaf-parasites) 250 Fresh-water Alga;
1,500
And two quarto volumes of Essex Mosses, neatly mounted
and in good preservation.
The books are, Gibson's Flora of Essex; Hassell's British
Fresh-water Alga (2 vols); Mudd's Manual of British Lichens;
Wilson's Bryologia Britannica, and Leighton's British Lichen Flora.
All these books were Varenne's working copies, and they contain
many marginal notes of Essex and other localities in his hand-
writing.
Essex botanists will regret to hear of the destruction of the
Varenne flowering-plants. It is an instance of what so commonly
happens in such cases. The proper home of local collections is
the nearest local Museum. How many specimens and collections
are there, now mouldering away in country houses in Essex ?
The owners are tired of them, but they cannot summon up
courage to place the specimens where they would be cared for
and valued, and where they would be of use to those studying the
natural history of the County.
VII.—PETRICOLA PHOLADIFORMIS IN
ESSEX AND KENT.
For some years past conchologists have been aware of the
existence in England of a shell whose true home is on the east-
central coast of North America. It was first noticed, probably,