KEMINISCENCES. Ixxxi 



occupied as our greatest authority and most patient teacher and guide in our 

 study of these puzzling plants. No British botanist who realizes even partially 

 the invaluable work done by him throughout the course of his long professorial 

 career can, I think, fail to be both interested and instructed by this fragment 

 of his last work for us. With Mrs. Babington's permission, I have also 

 extracted from the body of the work the Professor's account of M. lentiginosus 

 Lees. I have thought this too obscui*e a form to claim a place in our Rubus 

 list ; but I have now had the advantage of seeing Lees's authentic specimens 

 in the Cambridge Babington Herbarium, and I find them identical with the 

 plant described by Dr. Focke, and published only last year in Griffith's 

 Fl. Angl. and Carnarv. as B. camhricus Focke. This latter name must 

 now of course give place to R. lentiginosus Lees, published so long ago as 

 1849 in Steele's Sandhooh, p. 60. Dr. Focke would place it next to 

 B. Questierii Lefv. and Muell. — W. Moyle Rogees.] 



Preface. 



The time seems to have arrived when a new treatise on the 

 British Eubi is required, and as I am told that this is expected from 

 me, I have endeavoured to prepare one. It does not supersede 

 my British Eicbi, the object of which was to ascertain the plants 

 intended by British authorities up to the time (1869) of its pub- 

 lication. My chief object now is to endeavour to identify our 

 plants with those of the continental authors, especially Focke and 

 Genevier. 



I now possess the means wanting to me in 1869, for the whole 

 herbarium of Genevier has come to Cambridge, and through the 

 kindness of Dr. Focke I possess named specimens of most of his 

 species ; many others which he could not give me, have been 

 obtained by the liberality of English botanists, who have had 

 their plants named by him. I feel therefore that probably the 

 duty of preparing a new British Rubi has really devolved upon 

 me. But the further I go in the study of our native plants, the 

 clearer it becomes that we really are far from truly understanding 

 them. As my former book was only provisional, this also cannot 

 claim any higher position. If it helps forward those who are 

 studying this difficult genus, my Avishes are fully met. 



Not only is much continued study of the plants required before 

 we can decide what forms are to be accepted as species, what are 

 permanent varieties, and what are only variations which may be 

 expected to revert when propagated by seed to the more permanent 

 forms, and also which of them may be fairly considered as the 

 result of hybridization, but a careful study of them all in the living 

 state must be made. Unfortunately living in a district where Ruhi 

 are far from abundant, it has been out of my power to do this, and 

 therefore I may, nay must, have fallen into error in many cases. 

 Those botanists who are more favourably situated must be looked 

 to for making the necessary corrections. This book can only be 

 considered as a preliminary, very far from a final, determination 



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