458 MOUIS lUKKA. 



iiicsque, which arc generally treated by him as species: hut, from ohservalions of 

 our own, as well as the opmiDU of others, we rei^aril them only as varieties: 



1. M. K. I'Ai.i.iuA. ritU-J'niUfd Red-J'ruittd Mulberry; with Iruit of a pale-red 

 colour. 



2. M. R. HKTEKOPUYLLA. Var'wus-lcaicd Red-fruited Mulberry] with all the 

 leaves unlike. 



3. -M. K. KiPAKiA. Ricer-bn)ilc-inhabitiu<j[ Red-fruited Mulberry ; Water Mul- 

 berry. Wild lihirlc Mulberry, of the Pemisylvanians. This variety differs from 

 the species in having longer petioles, ovate, deeply cordate leaves, which are 

 seldom laterally lobod, quite smooth, and thin, crenatc, serrate, acute, but neither 

 acuminate nor oblique at the base. It forms a handsome tree, growing on the 

 banks of the Susquehamiah, in the Alleghany Mountains. The leaves are from 

 three to five inches long; and the fruit is of a dark-red. 



1. M. R. CANADENSIS. CdiKuluui Rtd-fruiled Mulberry ; called R(m:/c Mulberry, 

 when growing on rocky steeps. The leaves of this variety are ovate, oblique, 

 rounded at the base, but not cordate, serrate, acuminate, and smooth. It is a 

 native of Canada, the northern parts of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New 

 York, and the Alleghany Mountains. 



5. M. R. PARViFOLiA. Snuill-leaved Red-fniitcd 3Tulberry ; called Lidian Mul- 

 berry, by the inhabitants of the Alleghanies. The leaves of this variety are from 

 one to two inches long, are smooth, ovate, acute or obtuse, not lobed, equally 

 sub-crenate, truncate at the base, often oblique, and supported by long, slender 

 petioles. The fruit is very small, oblong-ovate, of a very pale-red colour, and 

 sweet taste. It is a native of the Alleghany and Apalachian Mountains, and is 

 said to have been cultivated by the Indians. 



Geography and History. The Morns rubra is found near the northern extrem- 

 ity of Lake Champlain, and at the head of Lake Winnipisiogee, which may be 

 assumed as the northern limits of this tree. As a temperate climate is favourable 

 to its increase, as we progress southward it becomes more multiplied; but along 

 the Atlantic, it is proportionably less common than many other trees which do not 

 form the mass of the forests. In the lower parts of the southern states, it is much 

 less frequently seen, than at a distance from the ocean, where the soil and vege- 

 table productions wear a different character. It is most frequently met with in 

 Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee, and particularly abounds 

 on the banks of the Wabash, the Illinois, and the Missouri, which is attributable 

 to the superior fertility of the soil. 



This species was cultivated in Britain, according to Parkinson, early in the 

 XVIIth century. He says, in his " Paradisus," "it grows quickly with us to a 

 large tree," and that "the fruit is long, red, and pleasantly acid." Miher men- 

 tions a tree of this species in the garden at Fulham Palace, which, in 1731. had 

 been there many years without producing any fruit ; but which, at some seasons, 

 bore a great number of catkins, much like those of the hazel-nut; which caused 

 Ray to give it the name of Corylus. Almost the only plants of the Morus rubra, 

 of much magnitude, in the environs of London, are those mentioned by Mr. Lon- 

 don, as growing in the garden of the Horticultural Society, and in the arboretum 

 of Messrs. Loddiges, at Hackney. In 1836, these trees were from eight to six- 

 teen feet high. 



In France, in the Jardin des Plantes, at Paris, there is a tree of this species, 

 which, in fifty years after planting, had attained the height of forty-five feet, 

 with a trunk a foot and a half in diameter, and an ambitus or spread of branches 

 of thirty-eight feet. 



In Italy, at Monza, there is a Morus rubra, which, in sixty years after plant- 

 ing, had attained the height of twenty-six feet, with a trunk two feet in diame- 

 ter, and an ambitus of thirty feet. 



