188 On the Species of the Genus Primula in Essex.
until they were nearly over last year that the time to find them
was very early,41 I have never myself observed similar flowers
on the Cowslip (when pure) or on Primula farinosa; but Mr.
Clark, of York, has informed me that he remembers meeting
with single-flowered cowslips many years ago at Street. I am
sure, however, that they are extremely rare. I have sometimes,
in various species of Primula, seen a single flower on a jointed
stalk, but in this case I regarded it as belonging to an umbel
the rest of which had not been developed; in other words,
the peduncle supported a single pedicel only. With these
solitary flowers of P. elatior, however, the case is different.
They were on jointless stalks, generally about 3 inches long,
exactly as in the Primrose. I have already stated that these
flowers are very liable to become abnormal; and it is strange
that they are very often subject to one most marked variation,
and rarely to several minor variations, which I have never
on any occasion observed the flowers to be subject to when
growing in an umbel. I refer to what may be called the
leafy or foliated calyx. This, in the case of these solitary
flowers, appears so commonly that I should think nearly half
of them show it more or less. Sometimes the edges of the
calyx-teeth merely become green and wrinkled, but oftener
are developed into complete little leaves half an inch long or
more, and extending above the petals; while on several
41 In 1881 I noticed the first plant bearing them on March 17th, and
several more on April 6th,—a late season,—but they seem to have dis-
appeared soon after. In 1882 I noticed the first plant as early as
February 12th (flowers not quite open ; very early season, however). On
March 12th, in Monk's Hall Wood, I noticed at least twenty-five or thirty
such plants among a great number of others just on the verge of coming
out. On the loth, however, I was astonished at the number I saw in
Pounce Wood. The Oxlips were just on the point of coming into flower
abundantly, and, after searching for plants bearing these solitary flowers,
I believe that at the very lowest computation I saw fifty of them. On the
24th and 26th nothing like as many of these were noticeable; on the
28th I saw only two, on the 29th one only, and after that, though many
thousands of plants passed under my eyes, I only saw one or two. On
March 21st, 1883, nearly all the flowers I could find open in one wood
were solitary ones, but on the 23rd of the following month at the same
spot I could not detect a single example,