yal 
that glabrous means “smooth.” If very warty is smooth then the 
_ writer must not know what smooth is. It is Sai that the re- 
viser of the Betulacez took glabrous to mean not hairy, which is 
_ not true. But brushing this aside it still remains that B. pendula 
has not hairy twigs and leaves while B. alba has hairy twigs and 
leaves, or at least the beginning of hairs (puberulent) which is 
good if true, but even this fails in the var. minor which for all we 
know is a form of B. pendula. which shows that the character of 
pubescence is a feeble diagnosis. Now taking the branches we 
find that B. pendula has “slender, flexuous and drooping branches” 
while B. alba has ascending branches, nothing said about the 
slenderness or flexuostity and so they might be either so far as 
the text goes, while the writer knows that the branches of B. alba 
dent who tries to get anything out of it. The branchlets of B. 
pendula are “usually verrucose with resiniferous atoms” whic 
is a long way of saying réesinous-warty. In B. alba we find that 
hairs when present which is self evident if the branchlets are 
hairy as already stated. So briefly stated the branchlets of B. 
pendula are very resinous-warty, and of B. alba less so which 
ovate to deltoid or broad-ovate, subcunate, truncate o b- 
cordate at base, long-acumine, slender-petioled.” Now if the 
eaves are cuneate at base and long-acuminate a they can- 
not help being rhombic-ovate if the broadly-ovate. If 
they are cuneate to cordate at base they run the gamut of 
B. alba has ovate leaves, taper-pointed, rounded to cuneate at 
base, 3-6 cm. long, smooth. and green above, pale, glandular- 
dotted, and a little hairy on the veins beneath, sharply and un- 
equally doubly-serrate. Now comparing with B. pendula we find 
the leaves are glutinous when young; nothing said about it in 
alba, but in two varieties they are glutinous. In pendula the 
leaves are firm, nes said about alba. In pen atts the leaves 
therefore must be rhombic at times. In other words the leaves of 
SB: alba are ovate and those of B. pendula are broader, which is a 
