200 On the Species of the Genus Primula in Essex.
the lower one, growing up on a short stalk out of the middle
of the principal umbel.47 I once found two plants growing
together on a bank, and bearing five or six such umbels.
Occasionally specimens may be found growing in the open
bearing fasciated stalks, with an enormous number of flowers.
Of course these are not the result of "stimulation," although
one, which I gathered this spring on a roadside from which a
number of bushes had been cut, may have been so produced.
The peduncle was of great thickness, and bore 164 flowers
and buds, with others on several small stalks growing up
around the main one. In the centre of the umbel and on
the top of the peduncle there was a small round hole, the
shape of an inverted cone, and into this hole some of the
inner buds had been forced by the pressure of the rest.
I have seen several others of almost equal size growing
in fields at Chignal, and one which grew in my garden
in 1883 bore 173 flowers; while in the British Museum is
a specimen of Edward Forster's which had been cultivated
in the garden at Boconnor Parsonage. It has a flat stalk
about eighteen inches long, one inch broad, and bearing, I
believe, quite 250 flowers.
Although the flowers are pendant, the capsules are per-
fectly erect; they are somewhat round, and much shorter
than the calyx.
Mr. Varenne, of Kelvedon, writes me as follows:—" We
have two distinct-looking forms of P. veris growing here-
abouts ; (a) a hedge-bank plant, very tall, with long leaves
and small corolla-limb; (b) a much more dwarf plant, growing
in meadows, with short leaves, and expanded corolla-limb."
These two races are certainly noticeable in many other parts
of the county, but I suppose they are attributable to the
different situations in which the plants grow. The form "a"
flowers, I believe, some days earlier than "b."
Mr. Darwin says (' Forms of Flowers,' p. 56):—" The
Cowslip is habitually visited during the day by the larger
humble-bees (viz., Bombus muscorum and hortorum), and at
night by moths, as I have seen in the case of Cucullia."
47 As is normally the case in P. japonica.