lay above, having deeply embedded in it several bones apparently human; this rock indicating an antiquity almost as high as the limestone rock itself, for the breccia is so combined in parts, that its removal would occasion the rocks to collapse, so as materially to alter the external surface and form of the hills.

It is proper to add, that some fragments of bones have been found by digging in the loose earth of most of the caves, but from their imperfect state, and the vicinity of the breccia outside, it is difficult to determine whether they might not have originally belonged to it or not.

It appears from the description by Major Imrie, of the red ochreous cement containing bones which occurs at Gibraltar, and along the northern shores of the Mediterranean, that this breccia is of the same kind both in situ and character, and that its antiquity is at least equal to, if not much higher, than the bones found under stalagmite in caves, in different parts of Europe.

Description of several New or Rare Plants which have lately flowered in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, and chiefly in the Royal Botanic Garden. By Dr GRAHAM, Professor of Botany in the University of Edinburgh.

Banksia littoralis.

10th March 1831.

B. littoralis; foliis elongato-linearibus, spinuloso-dentatis, basi attenuatis, subtus aveniis; calycibus deciduis; folliculis compressis bracteisque strobuli apice tomentosis; caule arboreo, ramulis tomentosis.

Brown.

Banksia littoralis, Br. in Linn. Soc. Trans. 10. 204. ?-Id. Prodr. Fl. Nov. Holl. 392. ?-Rom. et Schultes, 3. 438 ?-Sprengel, Syst. Veget. 1. 485.? excl. syn.-Bot. Reg. 1363.

DESCRIPTION.-Shrub erect. Branches ascending, purple, villous. Leaves scattered, pubescent when young, naked and dark green above when old, densely covered with snowy tomentum below, on short erect petioles, linear, truncated, spinuloso-serrate, avenous, slightly revolute in the edges. Amentum (4 inches long, 3 inches broad to the extremity of the styles) terminal, upon a short leafy peduncle, the branches rising far above it from a whorl at its base. Flowers in pairs, forming double rather distant lines along the rachis, with which, when fully expanded, they form nearly right angles, expanding from above downwards. tea tomentous, green where exposed, yellow where included, either solitary, rhomboid, subacute, with the apex turned up, when they are

Brac

placed between the pairs of flowers, or geminate and rounded, and placed above or below them. Calyx 4-parted, covered with adpressed pubescence; claws linear, yellow, the spoon-shaped segments of the limb reddish, nodding. Anthers elliptical, subsessile in the cavities of the calyx. Style twice as long as the calyx, shining, of deep purple colour except at the base and apex, where it is yellow, deciduous, rigid, apex nodding. Stigma an abrupt glandular scarcely swollen termination to the style, retained for some time within the calyx, and, when liberated, covered with the yellow granular pollen, which gives it a capitate form. This species flowered in the greenhouse of the Botanic Garden in November 1830, immediately after B. speciosa, and remained in flower, forming a good contrast with this in its colours and manner of flowering. It seems quite different from Banksia microstachya of Cavan, and B. attenuata of Brown, with both of which Sprengel unites his B. littoralis. I have assigned the specific name to this plant doubtfully, and have quoted all the authorities cited above with hesitation, except the Botanical Register, because I have some reason to doubt its identity with the plant sent from New Holland by Mr Brown, and cultivated at Kew under the name of B. littoralis. The specimen which flowered with us we received from Mr Mackay at Clapton in 1828, without any name; and in 1829, we received from him a seedling, which has proved to be the same, under the name of B. collina, from which, however, it differs, in being destitute of veins on the back of the leaf. I have a specimen from Mr Fraser of a species which must stand very near to it, and is chiefly distinguished by the leaves being longer, narrower and quite entire, except near the apex, where there are four small teeth, and by the branches being much less hairy; in colour and manner of flowering it perfectly agrees. It must also in many respects agree with B. marginata, but differs from this in the bractea being tomentous.

Leria nutans, DC.

L. nutans; scapo unifloro, laterali; flore nutante; foliis runcinato-lyratis, medio contractis, undulatis, dentatis, subtus tomentoso-niveis, lobo terminali cordato-oblongis.

Leria nutans, Spreng. Syst. Veget. 3. 502.

Tussilago nutans, Willd. Spec. Plant. 3. 1965.

Dens Leonis folio subtus incano, flore purpureo, Sloan, Jamaica, 1. 255. t. 150. fig. 2.

Tussilago scapo unifloro, foliis lyrato-ovatis, Plum. Plant. Amer. fasc. 2. t. 41. fig. 1.

DESCRIPTION.-Root perennial. Leaves (3 inches long, 14 broad) all radical, spreading, recurved, runcinato-lyrate, undulate, veined, toothed, green and nearly naked above, densely covered with snowy tomentum below, contracted in the middle, below which they are very narrow and much sinuated; above the middle they are cordato-oblong, and more entire. Scape (6 inches high) lateral, erect, single-flowered, covered with snowy tomentum, especially above, destitute of scales. Flower nodding, white, or with a slight shade of purple. Anthodium imbricated, subcylindrical, scales subulate-linear, with a strong green middle rib, and tomentous membranous edges. Receptacle naked. Florets of the ray slender, female, ligulate, trifid, longer than the styles, which are bifid, having the stigmatic surface along the inside of the segments. Florets of the disk shorter than the ray, slender, 5-toothed, sub-bilabiate, the throat being slightly gibbous, and the division of the limb less deep on one side; stamens as long as the corolla. Style and stigma exserted, their structure as in the ray. Germen pubescent. Pappus stipitate, slightly rough. This plant was raised at the Botanic Garden from seeds obtained by Captain Bennet, R. N. from the West Indies in 1827. It has flowered in the stove in March last year and this. It has no beauty, nor can it be

3

attractive in cultivation, though Sloan attributes to it many virtues in very different cases, concluding the whole by stating, that" it is a remedy against all sorts of cold, for it is hot and bitter."

Elephantopus sericeus.

E. sericeus; caule piloso; foliis ovato-oblongis, subacutis, base attenuatis, crenato-serratis, supra leviusculis, glabriusculis, subtus mollissime piloso-sericeis; paniculo diffuso; bracteis subcordato ovatis, acutis; involucri foliolis exterioribus subulatis, interioribus tubam corollæ æquantibus. DESCRIPTION.-Root perennial. Stem (2 inches high) erect, short, branched, leafy, covered with white erect hairs. Leaves (5 inches long, 1 broad) ovato-oblong, spreading, unequally crenato-serrate, attenuated at the base, and at the insertion stem-clasping, dark green, and slightly covered with soft down above, below thickly covered, especially on the veins (which are numerous and prominent) and their primary divisions, with coarse yet soft somewhat silky hairs; middle rib very strong and prominent on both sides, especially below; leaves on the flower-stalk few, scattered, gradually smaller upwards. Flower-stalk (14 foot high) terminal, erect, slightly flexuose, leafy, tapering, panicled, pubescent. Panicle loose, the branches rising from the axils of the diminished leaves, erect. Bractea subcordato-ovate, acuminate, single, except from the confluence of several capitula at the extremities of the branches. Involucre about 4-flowered, of few leafets, the four inner subequal, lanceolate, 3-nerved, membranous at the edges, very slightly pubescent on the outside, hard and chaffy, outer leafets much shorter than these four, subulate. Corolla small, white, glabrous; tube equal in length to the involucre, curved, very slender, slightly dilated at the throat; limb 5-parted, segments secund, slightly callous at the apices. Pistil subexserted; germen green, obovate. Pappus of 5 simple hairs, very slightly dilated at the base. This species was raised from seed sent to the Botanic Garden by Dr Krous of Dominica in 1829. It has been added to Dr Hooker's berbarium from St Vincent and Trinidad. It is distinguished from E. Martii by the form of its leaves; by its much less hairy flower-stalk; by the form of inflo rescence; by the greater length of the involucra; and by the narrow more acuminate bracteæ. I think it is distinguished from E. mollis of Kunth, by the form of the bracteæ, and of the outer leafets of the involucre; by its leaves being nearly even on the upper surface; and by their being only moderately attenuated at the base, certainly less so than in some other species of the genus.

Celestial Phenomena from April 1. to July 1. 1831, calculated for the Meridian of Edinburgh, Mean Time. By Mr GEORGE INNES, Astronomical Calculator, Aberdeen.

The times are inserted according to the Civil reckoning, the day beginning at midnight
-The Conjunctions of the Moon with the Stars are given in Right Ascension.

On the 15th of April, there will be an occultation of Aldebaran by the Moon:

On the 2d of June, there will be an occultation of Jupiter by the Moon:

On the 9th of June, there will be an occultation of Aldebaran by the Moon:

The angle denotes the point of the Moon's limb where the phenomena will take place, reckoning from the vertex of the limb towards the right hand round the circumference, as seen with a telescope which inverts.