Mr. C. C. Babington on some species o/Epilobium. 245 



presents much difficultj^ Schul'z (Arch. ii. 49) quotes Sonder's 

 E. virgatum as a synonym of E. obscurum, where also he places 

 the E. virgatum of Godron. I am indebted to Mr. Sonder for 

 specimens gathered by himself near Hamburg (at one of the 

 places mentioned in his ' Flora') in 184.2, and sent to me with 

 the name of E. virgatum (Fries) ; but I have no doubt that they 

 really belong to E. obscurum. 



It will be noticed that I have not quoted the E. virgatum of 

 Koch (Syn. Fl. Germ.). It is omitted because there can be no 

 doubt that that eminent botanist was unacquainted with the 

 true characters distinguishing these plants ; and that, as he tells 

 us himself, he did not know the true E, virgatum until the 

 second edition of his work was nearly completed. He states 

 that most of the specimens called E. virgatum by him were 

 merely E. tetragonmuj or rather perhaps his words may mean 

 that they were E, obscurum, which he considered as only a slight 

 variety of that species. 



Dr. F. Schultz thinks that the E. virgatum of Fries's ' Summa' 

 is a hybrid between E. palustre and E. obscurum. As I have 

 not seen the true plant of Fries (for his published specimens are 

 respectively E. Lamyi probably and E. obscurum), it is out of 

 my power to form any certain opinion. Schultz and Grisebach 

 both place it in a section characterized by the plants possessing 

 stoles and hybernacula like those of E. palustre, whilst Fries 

 says that its stoles are "elongatos sparsifolios," like those of 

 E. obscurum, but that its seeds equal those of E. palustre, and 

 therefore are twice the size of those of E. obscurum. In another 

 place Schultz remarks, that the difference between E, virgatum 

 and E. tetragonum derived from the form of the seeds is not 

 discoverable. Supposing him to mean E. obscurum under the 

 name of E. virgatum, as is perhaps the fact, he is quite correct ; 

 but if E. chordorhizum (Fries) is intended, the size of the seeds 

 must be quite different, as we learn from Fries's definite state- 

 ment on the subject. Schultz also informs us (Arch. ii. 46) 

 that the E. Schmidtianum (Roskov.), noticed by Koch (Syn. 266) 

 under E. palustre, is not a broad-leaved state of E. palustre as 

 Grisebach supposes, nor a form of E. virgatum {E. obscurum) as 

 he formerly thought himself, but that it is a hybrid between E. 

 palustre and E. obscurum, to which he gives the name of E. ob- 

 scuro-palustre. I quite agree with Fries in believing that far too 

 many difficulties are attempted to be removed by supposing the 

 plants to be hybrids ; and also, that hybrids are seldom produced 

 naturally except in a few genera, such as Verbascum, and that 

 most of the plants that are so called will prove to be extreme 

 states of recognized species (see Fries, Mant. iii. 97). Never- 

 theless it is possible that there may be natural hybrids in this 



