454 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 



[December i, iS8$, 



iaua from Calisaya. (<■) Tlie plant tlnis rcniained as 

 very probablj merely one of the pseudo-varieties of tlie 

 bark dealers ^vhicll might not possess any botanical 

 characters Rufticiently definite to be able to be distin- 

 guislied in the field or in the herbarium. In Java no 

 doubt they knew better even then, but that was the 

 state of information prevailing in England and India when I 

 came to Ceylon at the beginning of 1880 ; and to the 

 freqnent and urgent requests of the growers of bark- 

 trees to say whether such were " Ledgeriana " or not, I 

 found it impossible to give any positive answer. 



Mr. Moens visited Ceylon in September 1880, and it 

 is to him that I am indebted for having first pointed 

 out to me that the plant had good definite characters. 

 These were familiar to him in Java as distinguishing all 

 the best and most marked trees which had come from 

 Ledger's seed(/) : and, so soon as I was satisfied that they 

 held good in Ceylon, I lost no time in making them 

 public. My description was based on the examination 

 and comparison of numerous fresh specimens ; and it 

 was an additional proof of the correct less of the name, 

 that the plants jneldiug them have all without exception 

 been traced back to Ledger's seed. 



■ In making (after considtatiou with Mr. Moens) 'Wed- 

 dell's variety into a specifs, I expressed some compunc- 

 tion for adding yet another specific name to this 

 already overburdened genus, but I gave what I 

 thought good reasons for the course followed ; 

 and I may now add that further experience has justified 

 it. (i/) Mr. Moens' own description has now appeared ; (/i) 

 it is much fuller than mine, but differs in no other respect 

 from it. 



Yet Mr. Howard asserts in his two earlier papers 

 that my plant is not " Ledgeriana" but a variety of 

 O. nncrantha ! It is true that in his most recent paper 

 lie acknowledges he "may be mi.staken" in this e.xtra- 

 ordinary determination; in making it, one can only 

 suppose that he could not have read my description with 

 any care ; but, looking only at the figures accompanying 

 it and remembering a former error of his own, (?) at once 

 accused me of a similar blunder. But ha\nng supplied a full 

 definition I must be judged by that rather than the 

 plates accompanying it. I expressed in the paper my 

 regret that I should be forced to figure so poor and 

 ill-growu a specimen, but it was the best I could get at 

 the time ; and the tree, apart from its stunted growth, 

 was considered by Mr. Moens as a very characteristic 

 example of the species. 



J[r. Howard fm-ther has matched these figures of mine 

 with one published in August 1873 in the " Bot. Maga- 

 ine" (tab. 6,052) under the name O. Calisaya, var 

 Josephiana, Wedd. This figure was made from a plant 

 which flowered in Mr. Howard's conservatory in 1872, 

 having been received from Kew. In the text accompany- 

 ing the plate Dr. (now Sir) J. D. Hooker tells us that 

 the plants were brought from South America by Pearce in 

 186G, and that several warJian cases of them were sent to 

 India in that year. He also says that it si ems to be 

 '* intermediate between calisaya and micrantha," Init 

 that Mr. Howard, after fir.st thinking it var. caUsayoiles 

 of the latter species, afterwards agreed with Dr. "Weddell 

 in calling it Josephiana Mr. Howard now says, " I 

 .should myself have preferred calling it C. micrantha, 

 var calisayoides," but it is remarkable that in 1S76 

 when he himself published another figure (Quia. Ind. Plant, 

 t. 9.) of identically the same plant in his green-house, he 

 should still give it the name of Josephiana, var. glabra. 



(f) Mr. Howard himself candidly avowed that, to him, 

 Ledgeriana's character was stamped "by its great 

 productiveness in pure quinine " (I. c.) ; Dr. 'Weddell did 

 notf however, include tins in his definition. 



(/) It is perfectly wellkuown that this seed was not all 

 the .same. There wei-e some very bad trees of quite 

 another type among those from the original sowing. 



(//) The dignity of " species " varies considf rably in 

 different genera, their characters being inevitably lighter 

 in such very uat^l^.^l genera as Cinchona. In fact 

 C. Ledgeriana is preity much on a level with most 

 of the other accepted species in the genus. 



(/() Kin'/ CvJtuur in Ade, pp. 75-77. 



(i) See his paper iu /oiirn, Linn. Soc. p. 310. 



Nor in the accompanying text (p. 86) does he say a 

 single word about it being more properly a variety of micr- 

 antha. Both these plates show a plant with large erect 

 white flowers and elavate buds ; and what resemblance Mr. 

 Howard can have seen between them and the figures 

 accompanying my paper I fail to understand. No wonder 

 Mr. Ledger "rejected" this plant. Mr. Howard does not 

 toll us why he " prefers to put it under micrantha ; so 

 far as the leaves go, it seems more rightly put under 

 Josephiana, where I see Mr. Moens also places it.(;')Hipe 

 fruit would help to determine this point. 



Of the other (or the same f) recorded intermediates 

 between Cali.sava and micrantha extremely little is 

 known. (it) Of the one called 0. Cahsaya, var pallida, 

 Wedd., no description or figure has been pubhshed ; of the 

 other, called C. micr.antha var calisayoides, a very brief 

 diagnosis by Weddell is all that we have. They are al- 

 lowed to approach one another extremely closely in fohage, 

 and the hark of each seems to have been called "calisaya 

 blanca," but I have no means of detennining whether 

 thev be identical. 



■The next point Mr. Howard remarks upon is that no 

 analysis of the hark of the tree figured by me was given, 

 and appears to think this a serious ornission. Can he men- 

 tion any other genus of plants where it is necessary to give 

 such an analysis in describing a new species ; and, if not, why 

 should it be required iu Cinchona? However important it 

 may be in other respects, I attach no value to chemical com- 

 position as defining species or varieties. We know indeed 

 from experience that out of 10 trees mth the characters 

 Mr. RIoens and I have pointed out probably will yield 

 a large, though variable, percentage of quinine almost 

 unmixed with the other alkaloids ; but the other one may 

 be as poor as an ordinary Calisaya. It is true that 

 the bark of the actual tree figured was never analyzed, 

 but it was one of a row of several all of precisely the 

 sanie botanical type, and the analysis of the bark of some 

 of these has been published by iVIr. Agar the proprietor.(0 

 The analysis, as it happens, was made by Mr. Howard • 

 himself " who pronounced it to be Ledgeriana bark." 



Now, as to the magnificent pictures illustrating or forming 

 the basis of Weddell's diagnosis of var. Ledgeriana, 

 they are no doubt fine examples of Fitch's work, and 

 one cannot but admire the skill which can produce 

 such restorations from the dried mummies^ in a 

 herbarium. But it is risky work, and the botanist is but 

 too familiar with the want of that sort of accui-acy 

 which he particularly needs, so often to be seen 

 in the work of even the best botanical artists. In 

 these plates none of the characteristics of the flower 

 of Ledgeriana are accurately shomi so as to be beyond 

 dispute": the points mis.sed are just such as would be 

 likely to escape an artist unless his attention were 

 drawn to them, and they were not then known to Mr. 

 Howard himself. Nor has the artist caught the facies 

 or habit ' of the plant any better than the details (as 

 may very well be seen by comparison with the phototypes 

 illustrating Mr. Jloens' " Kina Oultuur"), whilst the 

 gaudy and inaccurate colouring makes them still less 

 like reality. 



It is necessary to say thus much about the'e plates 

 because Mr. Howard seems to regard them as so accurate 

 Bs to justify him in speaking of them as though they 

 superseded type-specimens of the plants themselves. This 

 appears when we endeavour to' ascertain what, after all, 

 he considers his var. Ledgeriana to really be botanic- 

 ally. It is, he says, to be restricted to " the * Kojo ' bark 

 of Ledger," which is "one form of Dr. Weddell's second 

 division of 0. Calisaya :" I'w) further, it is Howard's 

 "form A(platel'V') exclusive of Band C" (plates V and 



ij) Kina Cultiim; p. 84. 



(k ) This little is to be found in the introduction to Howard's 

 " Illivstratiuns," p. v. and Weddell's "Notes" in Ann. .S'c. 

 Nat., ser. o. xi. 3lil, and xii. .31 and 37. Triana {NoiOK T.l. 

 pp. 6'2, 7,5) puts both under micrantha, 



'{I) Ceylon Observer, 24th June 1883. They gave 7 per 

 cent pure quinine and only a trace of other alkaloids, 

 being then Ah years old from planting out. 



()») That Is, of an amplification by Howard of 0. Cali- 

 saya var microcarpa, M'edd., described in Ann. .1c. 

 Nat.. 1, c. p. 54, with the vernacular names of "Oalisaya 

 Zamba =aud " 2ambita." 



