NAT. ORDER. 

 Pomaceoe. 



PYRUS BOLLWYLLERIANA. COMMON PEAR-TREE. 



CSass XII. IcosANDRiA. Or(kr IV. Pentagynia. 



Gem. Char. Calyx, with an urceolate tube, and a five-lobed limb. 

 Petak, roundish. Styles, usually five, rarely two or three. 

 Pome, closed, five-celled. Seeds, two in each cell. 



ii^e. Oiar. Leaves, ovate. Corymbs, many-flowered. Fruit, tur- 

 binate, small, orange-yellow. Plowers, white. 



The wild Pear-tree, from whence have originated (by cultiva- 

 tion) the various variety of fruits, together with the Wild Apple, or 

 Crab-tree, are natives of this country, and belong to one family. 

 The common Pear-tree rises from twenty to thirty-five feet in height, 

 covered with a rough, gray, ash-colored bark ; the branches are firm, 

 thickly set, upright, and in the cultivated state unarmed ; the leaves 

 are simple, pinnate and terminal; cymes, many-flowered; bracteas 

 subulate, deciduous. 



The Pear-tree is called poirier in French, birnbaum in German, 

 and pe7-o in Italian. In its wild state, the Pear is a thorny tree, with 

 upright branches, tending to a pyramidal form, in which it differs 

 materially from the apple-tree. The twigs or spray hang down ; the 

 flowers in terminal villous corymbs, produced from wood of the pre- 

 ceding year, or from buds gradually formed on that of several years' 

 growth, on the extremities of very short protruding shoots, techni- 

 cally spurs. It is found in a wild state in Britain, and abundantly 

 in France and Germany, as well as in other parts of Europe, not 

 excepting Russia, as far as latitude 51°, and nearly in every section 



Vol. iii —130. 



