48 THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
Dipsacus sylvestris. Great Warley; Bidens tripartita. Shenfield,
Ingrave; Achillea ptarmica, South Weald, Little Warley;
Matricaria chamomilla, South Weald, Little Warley, East
Horndon; M. suaveolens, Great Warley, Chelmsford; Picris
echioides, Bulphan; Crepis biennis, Shenfield; Lactuca virosa,
East Horndon; Hottonia palustris, Shenfield, Doddinghurst;
Anchusa sempervirens, Shenfield; Melampyrum pratense. Great
Warley, Little Warley; Lamium galeobdolon, South Weald,
Blackmore, Stondon; Euphorbia esula, Shenfield; Luzula
pilosa, Ingrave; Lemna polyrrhiza, Ingrave; Carex pendula,
South Weald, Margaretting, Buttsbury; Alopecurus myosuroides,
Bulphan, Little Warley. South Weald; Cynosurus echinatus,
Shenfield, South Weald: Melica nutans, South Weald, Little
Baddow; Glyceria distans, Shenfield; Lolium temulentum,
Bulphan; Ceterach officinarum, Great Warley.
[Those who wish to compare the floral poverty of Warley Common
to-day, as set forth in Mr. Clarke's notes here printed, with its wealth
eighty years ago, should refer to an article entitled "A notice of Plants
growing spontaneously in and about Warley Common, in Essex," by Dr.
Aeneas MacIntyre, published in the Proceedings of the Botanical Society
of London, in 1839. (vol i., pp. 16-21), which enumerates many interesting
species (701 altogether) and speaks of Osmunda regalis as "very
abundant" in a boggy wood, otherwise uninteresting, on its eastern side.
I call attention to this paper because, though Gibson evidently knew of
its existence (see Flora of Essex, p. xxii.), he knew apparently nothing of
its contents, none of which is quoted in his Flora.—Ed.)]
Fungus on Stem of Oak Tree.—A very large fungus has flourished for
years on the base of the stem of a fair-sized oak-tree growing on a hedge-
bank by the side of the road between my house and Chelmsford, and in
the parish of Writtle. I have seen it many hundreds of times. It is some
eighteen inches across by fifteen inches deep, and it appears to be about six
or eight inches through. It grows just on the top of the bank, in a fork of
the base of the stem, where two main roots begin to divide. During the
summer, it is usually of a rosy or pinky-buff colour; but, as winter ap-
proaches, it takes on a pallid, washed-out, pastey complexion. During
summer, too, it exhibits (especially near its lower margin) a large number
of deep holes or pores, about half-an-inch across, in each of which stands
a large glistening drop of water, apparently of a deep rich brown tint.
These drops have, when the sun is shining on them, the bright pellucid
appearance of a cat's eye, and render the whole thing strikingly hand-
some. To some extent, I believe, the water in these pores drips away
and is lost; but it is renewed regularly (no doubt from the sap of the tree),
thus always keeping the pores rim-full, until the coming of winter, when,
they largely close. In the lower part are a number of bullet-holes, left
by someone who has used the fungus as a target for revolver-practice.
At the bottom, dead grass has grown through, or become enclosed in,
the body of the fungus.
This striking fungus evidently belongs to the genus Fomes. I do not
recollect seeing another specimen quite like it; or,at least, not so
large.—Miller Christy, Chignal St. James, Chelmsford.