55 
BERBERIS actinacantha. 
Ray-spined Berberry. 
GYNANDRIA MONANDRIA. 
Nat. ord. BERBERIDACEZ. 
BERBERIS. Botanical Register, vol. 12. fol. 1176. 
B. actinacantha ; spinis palmato 5-fidis margine revolutis, foliis ovatis ellip- 
ticisve brevissimé petiolatis basi vix attenuatis rigidis spinoso-dentatis 
mucronatis junioribus integerrimis, pedunculis 4-5 subumbellatis foliis 
brevioribus subcernuis, germinibus ovatis vix attenuatis. Martius in 
Rem. $ Schult. Syst. Vegetab. 7. 12. Hooker $ Arnott in Bot. Misc. 
3. 135. 
An evergreen bush, apparently common in the neighbour- 
hood of Valparaiso, whence it has been brought by all collec- 
tors of Chilian plants. It is not, however, a plant of the 
coast, but inhabits the first range of the Cordilleras. 
It derives its name from the broad ray-like divisions of 
the spines, which are sometimes very remarkable, much more 
so indeed than in our figure. But in this respect it varies 
according to the circumstances under which it grows. In 
some specimens gathered in Chili by Mathews, the palmate 
spines are very large, in others from the same botanist, they 
are very small; in some, brought from the baths of Collina 
by Macrae, they are much the same as those now represented. 
The leaves, too, vary in form from roundish-ovate to ovate, 
and even subcordate. They always have a hard, dry, curled 
appearance, as if the species were accustomed to a rigorous 
climate. 
Our figure was made in April, 1845, in the Garden of 
the Horticultural Society, where its deep yellow sweet-scented 
flowers render it rather a conspicuous object of the smaller 
sort. | 
It is a small hardy sub-evergreen shrub, growing three 
or four feet in height and flowering freely in May and June. 
It grows freely either in the American border, or on a 
rock work if planted in a rich sandy loam. 
