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78
FURTHER RECORDS FROM ICELAND.
By Arthur Bennett, F.L.S.
In this Journal for March, 188G, I recorded the additions to the
Flora of Iceland, made after the publication of ' Groenlund's Flora '
in 1881.
I here propose to notice those that have since been added up to
1889, and to endeavour to show what is still required to clear up
many points connected with Icelandic Botany. Naturally, it
is to the Danish botanists we look for the principal part of this
work ; but still British botanists, entomologists and tourists, can
aid very materially. One difficulty is to know what is wanted, and
to some extent to obviate the gathering over again of plants well
known to exist in the island. I have given a list, at the end of this
paper, of records needing to be confirmed by specimens, confining
myself, however, to those numbered by Prof. Babington in his
"Revision of the Flora of Iceland," in the Linuean Society's
Journal, 1870, pp. 282—348.
If any one visiting Iceland should see any of these plants, they
will do a service to Icelandic Botany by submitting them to Prof.
Babington, or Dr. Lange, of Copenhagen.
A good many (perhaps most) of the species not numbered are
geographically unlikely to have ever occurred. One factor is
evidently gaining ground in Iceland, i. e., the introduction of plants
that accompany cultivation, such species as MeLilotus alba, B ramus
secalinus, &c., are, as Rostrup observes, merely weeds.
The principal papers that have appeared on the Flora are by M.
Halldorsson Fridriksson, in the ' Bot. Tidsskrift,' 1882, pp. 45—78,
" Om Islands Flora." In this he criticises the work of Groenlund,
in his ' Islands Flora,' and defends the work of his countryman,
Hjaltalin, ' Islenzk Grasafrsed,' from Groenlund's certainly harsh
estimation of it,— " It is perfectly indifferent what plants figure, or
are named in that list,"—and cites the totally different value that
Babington placed on it. This was followed by Groenlund, in the
83-— IBl), with a paper in which he dis-
same year and place (pp.
cusses Fridriksson's criticisms. In these two papers the value of
the records of over one hundred species are reviewed by Fridriksson
and Groenlund. It should be stated that Groenlund's
standard was a specimen in some herbarium ; but here he was not
consistent, for (seemingly because Babington recorded several
plants as in " Solander's Collection " but not localised, which in his
' Flora ' he ignored) ; he was obliged to pass over several gathered
by Steenstrup and only labelled " Iceland," and Fridriksson calls
attention to these.
The latest paper is that of Dr. E. Rostrup, in ' Bofc. Tidsskrift,'
1888, pp. 168—186. He there records the new localities and new
species found by Fedderseu, Davidsson, Stefansson, Thorsddsen,
and Froeken Thora Fridriksson.
The following list contains these additions ; and it may be of
interest to sec how many of the species that were numbered by