From Ellen Hutchins to Dawson Turner   15 Dec 1807

Sir

I had the pleasure to receive your kind letter a few days ago. I am much obliged by your offer of sending me specimens of Alpine plants & shall be glad to have a few of any kinds that you can quite conveniently spare. Of the species of Jungermannia that inhabit mountains and mountainous situations I have got the following Alpina, ruspestris, curvifolia, Julacea, Cochleariformis, ciliaris, quinquedebtata, & the species enclosed which is very common on all the mountains in this neighbourhood growing in large loose tufts. I need not trouble you to give me any of those and if you should want specimens I shall be very glad to send them to you. Of mosses and lichens I know very little & I fear am not likely to learn much of them as I cannot hear of any english books to assist me with Withering. Should I hereafter be able to learn more it would give me great pleasure to find anything worth your acceptance. At present I am quite a beginner having been only a little more than two years attending to any part of Botany in a country very remote from assistance and unacquainted with any person nearer than Dublin to correct all my mistakes —

I hope you have before this time received a parcel of sea plants that Mr Mackay has forwarded to you. He has been so kind as to say that he would forward to you anything I may have to send & I think he will have the goodness to take care of those things you are so obliging as to offer to me. I am much pleased to find that you liked the varieties of F laceratus I sent. Of the strongly veined ones one I never met with more than the specimen you have. Should I be more fortunate next season I shall not neglect to preserve some for you. Of the other I have sent you some of the best specimens I could find & wish to know if you have any desire to have more of it. I met with it only in one spot for a short time in the month of June — Of the Fucus sent by Mr Mackay which I am glad to find you consider worth a place in your work, I sent you the two best specimens I found (in the parcel) marked No 4. I could find it only from the 28th of March to the 14th of April when it seemed quite going to decay. It is thrown up by the sea at the south side of Reendonogan point and at Garnish Island at the entrance of the harbour of Glengariff. I met with one young plant growing on the north side of Whiddy Island, all in this bay. The root is round, flat and about half an inch across beautifully waved at the edge. The midrib runs through or nearly through the whole plant. It is very round and strong next the root but becomes gradually more faint towards the ends of the leaves. Many fronds arise from the same root, from a single one to six or seven. The fructifications resemble those of F hypoglossum & when they burst the seeds are placed as in that species in lines that either side the midrib, I saw them burst. The edges of the plant are much waved. It seems to me greatly to resemble F hypoglossum though a much larger plant. Its colour when recent is much more brilliant than after being dried. It changes like most of the fine red plants to a purplish red. When I meet with it again I think I shall be able to preserve its colour better, and to send you some good specimens. My friends wish me to have the honour of being mentioned by you as the person who found this plant. As to its name I have no choice — Mr Mackay writes me that the Ulva I have sent you marked No 5, was first described by you. I am very glad to have met with it. Will you do me the favour to tell me its name, & also if you wish to have more specimens of it, or any of the plants I have sent. Those I have not written the names to, I shall know by the numbers — I now regret that I did not send you more of the plants of this bay as you say you should be glad to have any of them. However I shall have them for you next summer. It would give me great pleasure that the little I can do should be of any use to you. Fucus ovalis is very common here & we have dasphyllus. I should be very glad to get a specimen of F tenuissimus & of F plicatus & fruticulosus if you have them to spare. We have got one small variety of F bifidus, (the 4th of your Synopsis I believe) & the only one we have, it is rare. F laciniatus is very common. I have met with one fragment of pendunculatus. I was greatly delighted to find F Wigghii. I knew the plant on the shore by the plate you sent me without comparing it with the description. I found about 10 or 11 plants in a fortnight. Should you like to have more of it? We have F palmetta always on the stalks of F digitatus. F tuberculatus is an inhabitant of this bay, but is not common. Our species have not the taste you describe. F ligulatus is very common growing on all the rocks here in deep water, it is never that I have seen left bare by the tide. It begins to grow in March, & attains a large size in a very short time. In very vigorous plants a nerve runs through the leading shoot and larger branches — Of flowering plants I take the liberty to mention the following that I may know if you wish for any of them. We have a great many coloured varieties of Anthyllis vulneraria, Centunculus minimus very common in marshy places with Linus radiola & Exacum filiformis. Pinguicula Lusitanica common, Carex extensa & distans, Saxifraga geum, Bartsia viscosa very common, Euphorbia hiberna extremely common, the country people here poison fish with it by putting it in rivers, and they eat the fish without injury — a pretty variety of Blechnum spicant. Most of those plants are considered rare by Mr Mackay the only botanist who I believe visited this country. Arbutus unedo grows in great plenty within five miles of this place in the mountains — of Sertulariae I am only just beginning to acquire a little knowledge. Should I meet with any rare ones I shall have the pleasure of sending you some. Of shells I have as yet too little knowledge to know what to offer you, though I have some native & foreign. I have collected such as I could find for my good friend and instructor in Botany Dr Stokes of Dublin —

Our shores are too rocky to produce many species but we have immense banks of coral sand which is very useful & valuable for manure, with it we get many shells. We have the large scallop with one valve flat in great plenty — I am told our species of Echinus’s are very fine. We have two, one pale red of about 14 inches circumference the other purple about 11 inches with much longer spines than the last. In summer we find plenty of the beautiful Patella pellucida on Fucus loreus. Of this Fucus we have a variety that perhaps you have not met with. It is not more than one third of the breadth of what you describe in your synopsis, much less compressed and of a very yellowish olive colour. —

I have taken the liberty to trouble you with a very long letter, in the hope that I may mention something that you may like to have specimens of —

I beg leave to assure you of the respect & esteem with which I remain dear Sir your

much obliged servant

E Hutchins

Ballylickey

December 15th 1807

the little Conferva enclosed grows in a cavern by the sea & is very beautiful when fresh. I lately got C Rothii and duplicates in small quantity —