genus is of the Linnæan class Syngenesia, and order Superflua; and of the Natural order Compositæ.

The chrysanthemum and many other exotic flowers now continue to bloom for so long a period in the autumnal months, that he who would write "to a friend in autumn," as Barry Cornwall has done in the following lines, had need say something of the floral charms of October and November to render it complete :

Friend! the year is
overgrown:
Summer like a bird hath flown,
Leaving nothing (fruits nor flowers)
Save remembrance of sweet hours;
And a fierce and froward season,
Blowing hard for some rough reason,
Rusheth from a land unknown.

Where is laughing May, who leapt
From the ground when April wept ?
Where is rose-encumbered June ?
July, with her lazy noon?

August, with her crown of corn?

And the fresh September morn?

Will they come back to us-soon ?-soon?

THE CLUSTERED BELL-FLOWER.

Campanula glomerata; W.

It was on one of those magnificent days in August, when the sun glows with intense heat, ripening the golden corn ready for the reaper's hand, that we set out to perambulate some extensive chalk hills. Our object was mainly to breathe the free air on the lofty heights, for we were well aware that the heat, though scorching in the vale, would be greatly moderated when we began to mount the acclivities of the rising ground. And so it proved; we no sooner got free of houses and plantations of crowded trees, than we found a delicious air fanning our heated brows, and producing quite an enchanting atmosphere. It was too hot to walk at a rapid pace, so we began to gaze around, stopping continually to admire this or that prospect; to examine one flower and then another, however insignificant it might be; we could cast our eyes around us for a considerable distance, our view being uninterrupted by hills or trees, except at very remote points; we could see wave after wave of the highly rarified atmosphere, rising from and passing over the surface of the hills, and we were charmed with the delectable feeling produced by all that we met with; and not the least interesting attraction that we found was a solitary specimen of the Clustered Bell-flower, growing on the borders of a grass field, beneath the shade of a dwarf hawthorn hedge. It was indeed a treasure, valued the more because we had not met with one before.

We found the root to consist of strong woody fibres.

The stem was erect, but not more than six or seven inches long, though it sometimes grows to the height of twenty inches. It is angular, simple, sometimes but rarely branched, and of a slightly purple tinge, and clothed with hairs. The leaves of this species of Bell-flower are alternate; those which spring from the root are on long footstalks, of various shapes, commonly oblong, lance-shaped, heart-shaped at the base; the upper leaves are chiefly sessile, on short footstalks, partly clasping the stem at the base, of a paler hue beneath, and more hairy than on the upper surface, the margins finely notched; the upper leaves are occasionally entire. The hairiness of the leaves is very variable, the upper side being frequently nearly smooth, as also the under side. The flowers grow in a terminal spike, with axillary clusters of sessile flowers from the bottom of the upper leaves. These are large, erect, of a rich violet blue colour, each having at its base a bractea of greater or less size, broadly egg-shaped and acute. The calyx consists of five narrow lance-shaped segments, erect and downy. The corolla is large, erect, with fine acute segments, quite smooth, or with simple pale hairs, larger and sometimes more numerous on the inside than on the outside.

The Clustered Bell-flower delights in dry pastures, particularly on a chalky or clayey soil, and is said to be not unfrequent in England.

There are no less than six varieties of this beautiful wild flower noticed; all very pretty, and entitled to be introduced, as some have been, into the cultivated parterre, where they often lose considerably in depth of colour, occasionally becoming white, and their foliage

larger and more luxuriant. The Rev. J. H. Henslow, Professor of Botany in the University of Cambridge, has noticed the petals change, in some instances, to a bunch of leaves.

Dr. Deakin says that few, if any, of our native plants vary so greatly as this. Of the varieties he thinks that C. lancifolia is most like a distinct species, the leaves being all truly lanceolate, the margins waved, irregularly crenated, a fine green above, and scarcely hairy, beneath pale and much more hairy, the flowers small, stigma three-cleft, the lower leaves having long winged footstalks, the upper a broad one, but not embracing the stem.

This Bell-flower (Campanula glomerata) is perennial, and blooms in July and August, in some places in June; it belongs to the Linnæan class Pentandria, and order Monogynia, and to the order Campanulaceœ in the Natural system.