734 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 
The number of species of Ribus described by Sir J. E. Smith in the last 
edition of his English Botany, published in 1824, as natives of England, are 
14: Dr. Hooker, in his British Flora, published in 1831, enumerates 13; 
and Dr. Lindley, in his Synopsis of the British Flora, 2d edit., published in 
1835, 21; which, he says, may be reduced to 5, or possibly to 2, exclusive of 
the herbaceous species. In our Hortus Britannicus, 68 species are enumerated, 
as having been introduced into Britain; and in Don’s Miller, 147, as the total 
number described by botanists. 
The remarks which Dr. Lindley has made on this subject appear to us 
extremely interesting and valuable, not only with reference to the genus 
Ribus, but to all genera that contain numerous species. Following out the 
principles laid down in the elaborate monograph of Weihe and Nees von 
Esenbeck, Dr. Lindley, in the first edition of his British Flora, advanced the 
number of British species to 23; “certainly,” he observes, “not from any 
expectation that such species were either genuine, or likely to prove perma- 
nent, but with a view of following out the recognised principles of distinc- 
tion, and showing whither they must inevitably lead.” In the second edition, 
he observes: “This proceeding has not found favour in the eyes of those 
from whom I most expected applause :....it has had one good effect how- 
ever;....it has led me to consider the subject very carefully, and to examine 
with more attention the nature of the principles upon which the modern and 
recognised species of Ribus have been established ; I have also had six years 
of additional experience ; and I am bound to declare, that I can come to no 
other conclusion than that with which I first started; namely, that we have 
to choose between considering R. suberéctus, 2. fruticosus, R. corylifolius, 
and R. cz‘sius, the only genuine species; or adopting, in a great measure, the 
characters of the learned German botanists, Weihe and Nees von Esenbeck, 
who have so much distinguished themselves in the elaboration of the genus. 
So clear is my opinion upon this point, that, if it had been possible to prove 
the four species to which I have alluded to be themselves physiologically dis- 
tinct, I should at once have reduced all the others to their original species ; 
but, as it is in the highest degree uncertain whether R. fruticosus, 2. coryli- 
folius, and R. cze‘sius are not as much varieties of each other as those which 
it would be necessary to reject, I have thought it better to steer a middle 
course, until some proof shall have been obtained either one way or the other. 
Accordingly, as will be seen by what follows, I have taken R. fruticosus, R. 
corylifolius, R. cz‘sius, and R. suberéctus as heads of sections; and I have 
assigned to them characters which may be considered either as sectional or 
specific, according as the evidence may ultimately preponderate. I have also 
arranged as species under them those forms which are the best marked, and 
the most certainly distinguishable. This will bring the genus Rubus somewhat 
into the situation of Rédsa; in which, I fear, we must be satisfied with leaving 
it for the present.” (Lind. Synop. Brit. Fl., 2d edition, p. 92.) It appears to 
us highly probable, that the four forms mentioned above are only varieties of 
the same species ; and this would reduce the ligneous British rubuses to the 
raspberry and the bramble. The species exclusively North American, as far 
as we have observed them in the garden of the Horticultural Society, include 
four with the habit of raspberry, and three with the habit of the bramble; 
but the latter three, R. flagellaris, R. inérmis, and R. setosus, are probably 
only varieties of the same species. The Nepal rubuses, as far as they have 
been hitherto introduced, are all brambles; but there is one, 2. céncolor, 
which, Mr. Royle observes, is found on lofty mountains, and comes near to 
the raspberry. 2. micranthus is, perhaps, the only distinct species of Nepal 
bramble that has been introduced; some plants, raised from Nepal seeds, 
which may be observed in the Chelsea Botanic Garden, and in the garden of 
the Horticultural Society, being evidently nothing more than varieties of the 
British bramble. The course which we have adopted with respect to the 
ligneous species of this genus is, to give, first, a descriptive enumeration of all 
the ligneous species or varieties, indigenous or introduced, elaborated from 


