398 BICKNELL: HAvE WE ENOUGH NEW ENGLAND BLACKBERRIES ? 
strongly expressed but weakly held variations scattered broadcast 
among the forms of Rubus. 
My own study of this group, inadequate though it has been as a 
basis for assured conclusions, has led me notwithstanding, to make 
one addition to the number of our species. No need arises, however, 
for adding a new name to an already overburdened genus, for it 
seems possible with reasonable certainty to correlate this plant 
with the Rubus flagellaris of Willdenow, a trailing species allied to 
Rubus procumbens, which appears never to have been interpreted. 
This plant, which occurs on Nantucket and on Long Island, seems 
to possess the individuality of a true species and I have not been 
able to see how it can be accounted for as a hybrid. Furthermore 
it seems to be required as a parent of a series of Nantucket hybrids 
otherwise difficult or impossible to understand. This plant will 
be discussed in detail in another connection. 
It is more than probable that some other species of eastern 
blackberries than those here accepted may yet come to light. In 
different parts of their ranges there is to be observed a perturbation 
among some of our hybrid forms which would seem to indicate 
either the influence of some unrecognized unit of species quality 
or else a process of intercrossing among primary hybrids very 
difficult to elucidate. 
The wide fluctuations in the characters of all our blackberries 
under differing environments does not wholly obscure the fact that 
these variations in many cases take recognizable directions. It 
will doubtless ultimately be possible to define such tendencies with 
some approach to systematic form but, to use again the words of 
President Brainerd, it is to be hoped ‘“‘that only experts—after 
years of study—will attempt it.” 
Specimens representing all the hybrids here proposed which have 
not already been described in detail as species will be deposited in 
the herbarium of the New York Botanical Garden. And it is in- 
tended that descriptions shall follow as opportunity may allow. 
Current practice seems to require that the names of hybrid 
plants should bear the authority of the author by whom they were 
first proposed. It may be questioned whether by this usage the 
citation of an author’s name is not a little overstrained. Unlike 
the case of a true species, the precise relationship and identity of a 
