184 BRITISH BOTANY. 



are connected with the lowest or simplest or herbaceous group by 

 forms of R. ccesius, the procumbent shoots of which creep under 

 the herbage and produce slender, erect^ flowering branches^ which 

 are more or less tender, according as the form is more or less in- 

 cHned to the herbaceous or to the shrubby sorts. The leaves of 

 this intermediate group are only incompletely quinate, being 

 usually ternate, and having the lower pair lobed on the outer 

 side", — thus assimilating, in the lower or imperfect form, to the 

 lowest or ternate-leaved herbaceous group, and again resembling 

 the higher forms in the quinate-leaved plants. In some of the 

 forms of R. ccesius the stem is annual or sub-herbaceous (suffru- 

 ticose), producing flowers like the biennial stem, — thus supplying 

 an additional proof that the group R, casii is intermediate between 

 the herbaceous and shrubby species, both in the development of 

 the leaves and stem, and in the habit of the latter. The arma- 

 ture and clothing of the stem is so various in the ceesious group 

 that it connects the defenceless stems of R. Chamcemorus and 

 R. arcticus on the one hand, with the prickliest, most glan- 

 dular, and hairiest forms of the glandular sections, viz. RADULiE 

 and KcEHLERiANi. These two last-cited groups are very indefi- 

 nitely separated by the development of the leaves. The quinately 

 and ternately divided leaves are not sufficiently constant to afford 

 distinctive marks of species : both kinds are usually present on 

 the same plant. AU the forms, viz. the simple, the ternate, and 

 quinate leaves, are generally present on the same plant. For ex- 

 ample, the leaves of the barren stem and the lower leaves of the 

 fertile stem are quinate, the upper leaves of the fertile stem are 

 ternate, and the leaves of the inflorescence (panicle or cluster) are 

 simple. The shape, the hairiness, the pubescence, the teeth, and 

 the substance or original character of the leaflets, vary as much 

 as the stem does in its shape, armature, and clothing. The 

 organs even of the tomentose group, the most distinct, generally 

 fail in affording sufficiently distinctive marks. Even R. discolor, 

 the most typical of the British species, varies like the rest of the 

 species in the shape, the silkiness and hairiness of its stem, and 

 in the greater or less toinentum of the under side of the leaves. 

 Some are nearly white, some pale green, and some ashy-like be- 

 low. The shape and consistence of the leaves are as liable to 

 variation as their clothing. All the stems of all the species are 

 more or less hairy, and the more hairy -stemmed species gradually 



