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where I resided till 1854; and, being of a very retiring disposition and loving secluded necks, most of my waking hours, when duties were over, were spent in the broad glades of the forest, in its deep recesses, or in wanderings over the neighbouring heaths; always alone, and avoiding the residence of man; consequently, I have had many opportunities of observing the actions of the denizens of the forest, and the peculiarity of some Members of the feathered tribe, which those journeying in company might not have had. The Cuckoo is an extremely shy bird, and I have found many country persons who have never seen one, unless it has been when flying; and they may even then have supposed it to be a pigeon. A person must be very quiet, and hidden, or, in a general way, he will not set a near sight of this shy bird. Hence arise many mistakes. It is certainly here some days, at least, before uttering a cry at all, and then it is very infrequent and indistinct; but, as time goes on, the bird is beard very frequently and distinctly, and just before its departure it utters the repeated cry alluded to very frequently. I have never heard the peculiar cry early in the season; but it is evident, from Mr. Male's letter, that in some places the cry is so heard. The aged cottagers, in the neighbourhood I speak of, used always to remark, when the repeated sounds were uttered, "The Cuckoo is off, he does net like the haycocks;" and the better class would say, "The Cuckoo is bidding good-bye to Old England." In fine, in that part of the country, the cry was an acknowledged sign of its departure, With respect to the observation of Mr. E. J. Lowe, I must remark his observation will not apply to all parts, as I have watched the bird fly info a tree, utter the single cry two or three times, then the reiterated cry, and lastly fly off, perhaps uttering "cuckoo" while on the wing, So it is clear the habit of the bird is worthy of a closer observation, and that over a more extensive area than has yet been given it.—J. R. Thompson, Tamworth.
Rosa laterrosa (Nob.) in Warwickshire.—About five years since, I found a rose in one of the Solihull lanes which seemed to me to be a variety of Rose canina, but distinct, as I thought, from any of the varieties described in Mr. J. G. Baker's valuable monograph of the genus, and as it was very neatly allied to Rosa vertieillacantha, (Merat,) I labelled it in my herbarium, R. vertieillacantha variety. Recently, however, I received from Mr. T. R. Archer Briggs, of Plymouth, one of our best authorities on Roses, a specimen labelled Rose latebrosa, (Nob.,) and I at once saw that my rose from Solihull was identical with Mr. Briggs's plant; but to be more sure, I sent Mr. Briggs a specimen of the Solihull plant out of my herbarium, and received the following reply:—"Some time ago I arrived at the conclusion that a rose collected by yourself was identical with the plant from this neighbourhood (Plymouth) that M. Deseglise labelled Rosa latebresa (Nob.) The flowering specimen you have sent certainly puts the matter beyond all doubt. I am very pleased to see that this rose keeps up its characters in so widely separated parts of England." Plymouth and Solihull are at present, I believe, the only British stations for this rose, Mr. Briggs says it is abundant in his neighbourhood, but at present I have only seen it near Solihull, in Warwickshire, two fine bushes growing near together in that locality, It is closely allied to Rosa vertieillacantha, (Merat;) in fact, would follow that plant in natural sequence, but differs in having intermediate armnature on the flowering shoot, in this respect apparently approaching some of the spinosissina group. bis plant is, therefore, an addition to our Warwickshire rose flora. No English description has yet been published of this rose.—James E. Bagnall.
Notes oy THE Flora or Napton.—Understanding that the neighbourhood of Napton-on-the-Hill has not been much worked by botanists