372 Dr. Smith's Descriijtion of Duchesnea fragiformis. 



Limiocus, who was furnished by its author with specimens of 

 every tiling he described. The subject is followed up by the 

 same writer in an essay communicated to Lamarck, and pub- 

 lished in his Dictionnairede Botaiiiqiie, vol. ii. 528, in which per- 

 haps he may be thought to multiply distinctions Mithout necessity, 

 like all who study any subject with a microscopic eye. But if 

 the philosophical principles of strict specific ditFerences have not 

 particularly engaged his attention, that defect is supplied by 

 Ehrhart in his Beitr'dge, fasc. 7- 20, who in the direction of the 

 pubescence of these plants has found means to discriminate the. 

 species in a masterly manner. Willdenow in his Species Plan- 

 tarum has profited by these remarks, though he still retains an 

 error of Linnaeus in making a distinct species of the Fragariu mo- 

 nophylla. Curt. Mag. t. Q5, clearly shown by Duchesne to be a 

 variet\^ raised by himself from seed of the Wood Strawberry, 

 F. vesca, and found to return gradually to its original in a i'ew 

 generations, when propagated by the same mode. 



The plant I am about to describe seems peculiarly fit for the 

 purpose in view, on account of its resemblance and affinity to 

 Fragaria, though surely no genus can be more distinct. It affords 

 a new example of what 1 have often had occasion to remark, 

 that the genera of the Linnaean Icosaudria Polygynia, which is 

 itself a natural order, are not less distinct in nature than in tech- 

 nical characters. 



DUCHESNEA. 



Class, et Oud. Icosandria Polygynia. 

 Nat. Ord. Sent icos(B\ Ann. Rosacece ixi^s. 



EssENT. Char. Calyx decemfidus. Petala quinque. Bacca 

 supera, composita acinis monospermis. 



Nat. 



