274 THE NATUEALIST. 



besides, that in very natural genera it is often difficult to establish general 

 characters which shall admit all the species of a single group, is doubtless 

 the reason we have not yet attained to more satisfactory results. 



De Candolle was, I believe, the first botanist to seek for another 

 character than the form of the fruit, for the sub-divisions of the genus 

 Bosa. It was in his " Catalogus Plantarum horti botanici Monspeliense," 

 (1818) p. 137, that this celebrated botanist made the observation that many 

 roses having their styles united in a column, ought to form a distinct 

 section, which he proposed to call SynstylcBK In the supplement to his 

 *' Flore Franqaise " (1815) De Candolle makes no mention of this section 

 which he had proposed in 1813. 



Desvaux, " Journal hotanique," 1813, vol ii. — Koses indigenous to 

 France — makes two sections, according to the condition of the styles : — 

 1st Styles united ; 2nd Styles free. These divisions have been admitted 

 by a great number of authors, as Chevalier, ''Flore generale des Environs de 

 Paris " (1827); Merat, " Flore des Environs de Paris" ed. 4, (1836) ; Guepin, 

 " Flore de Maine-et-Loire," ed. 2, (1838) ; Boreau, " Flore du Centre de la 

 France et du hassin de la Loire,'' (1840, 1849, 1857) ; Delastre, " Flore de la 

 Vienne," (1842) ; Gpdet, " Flore du Jura;' (1853) ; Lloyd, '' Flore de V Quest 

 de la France," (1854) ; &c. This division proposed by Desvaux furnishes 

 one very good section, that with the styles united into a column, which, by 

 the species it includes, having the same form of prickle, leaves without 

 glands beneath, and very nearly the same habits, is certainly a very 

 natural section. The second section cannot be admitted without breaking 

 the series of the species, in spite of the sub-divisions which may be made 

 in it ; for in this section we find species which from the divisions of the 

 calyx, and prickles mixed with glanduliferous setae, seem badly placed in 

 the same group which includes species in which the prickles are all 

 uniform, and others which are without prickles ; the leaves present a still 

 greater anomaly, since species with glabrous, villose, tomentose, and 

 glandulose leaves are all comprised in the same group. 



Eau, '' Enumeratio rosarum," (1816), divides the 24 species admitted 

 by him, for the environs of Wurtzburg, into two sections, from the pre- 

 sence or absence of glands on the under surface of the leaves. These 

 characters are very useful for sub-divisions, but of no value whatever for 



(3) De Candolle, in making this word, seems to me to be guilty of a barbarism. 

 The principles of etymology, the formation of words given in the grammars, and the 

 Greek words (o-uo-TeXXco, Systole in anatomy) absolutely require Systijka. 



