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comes a tree, with a stem from eight inches to a foot and a half in 
diameter, having lost its light green color, and assumed a common 
‘brown, suitable for tree trunks. The roots become large, and 
spread widely. The trunk, however, always shows the sutures of 
the original sections; though one could hardly believe, at first sight, 
that they were all once green, juicy, flat and spatulate, like the new 
sections. ‘The tree thus formed is from about seven to nine feet 
high; but I have seen one or two as muchas fifteen. A few of them 
will stand together; and when over-run by the pendent smilax of 
the country, the long-suckered rubus, and sheltering beneath it the 
crocuses of different hues, with the “‘ wee, modest, crimson-tipped ” 
daisy, and the singular arums, present a very pretty sight. But the 
whole tangle is a fearful place to get against—to get into it is next 
to impossible. 
The flowers come out on the edges and flat surfaces (principally 
upon the edges) of the stem-sections, in spring; the ovary being 
nearly as large when the flower appears, as afterwards, when it be- 
comes ripe fruit. ‘Che flower above the ovary is very nearly of the 
same size and appearance as that of O. Rafinesquii, but with 
the yellow, shades of orange and even pink now and then appear. 
_ The ovary and fruit are much larger; but as one can see the 
fruit for sale in New York (rather small specimens), I will not 
describe it, except to say that it is furnished with the troublesome 
bristles, in whorls or nodules, like the stems of O. Rafinesquii; and 
that for eating, it is a little cooling, but too full of seeds for com- 
fort; very commonly eaten, by the poorer classes especially, and 
very cheap. The fruit is generally gathered by women and children, 
who use for the purpose a long pole with a sharpened nail, with 
which last they pierce the fruit and thus pull it off. It is shaken or 
rubbed around in a bag or basket to get off the bristles. 
Before the flowers are open, they have inside a plentiful sweetish 
- moisture, and are visited not only by ants, but by a peculiar insect 
which I cannot well déscribe, being no entomologist; but this 
insect I never failed to find in the imbricated, twisted perianth, 
_ before it began to open ; after the least opening at the top, the bug 
was gone. Such I found to be the case with every flower I tried; 
without one exception. I tried, probably, some thousands; for I 
made it a business to do them by hundreds, morning after morning. 
The number of flowers on an ordinary joint was about twenty ; 
rather more than less. Now and then there would be many together 
with from ten to eighteen; but not infrequently I have seen over 
forty on a joint; the largest number I remember was fifty-two. One 
can thus imagine the quantity of fruit in a hedge seven feet high, 
with the stem-joints so close together that a hen could not get 
through. A EE ALA. 
610, CHESTNUT STREET, PHILADELPHIA. Sore « 
§ 215. Dear Mr. Epiror :—Considering that your worthy CLur 
bears the name of that venerable man and scrupulously conscientious 
botanist who disliked most of all hasty and inconsiderate publication 
_ of genera and species, may an old botanist advise some younger ones © 
