BLACKBERRIES— VARIETIES, ETC. 24$ 



to six feet high, furrowed ; prickles strong and hooked ; leaflets 

 three to five, ovate or lance-ovate, pointed, their lower surface 

 and stalks hairy and glandular, the middle one long-stalked and 

 sometimes heart-shaped ; flowers racemed, rather large, with 

 short bracts; fruit oblong or cylindrical. 



"^. Canadensis^ Low Blackberry or Dewberry. Rocky and 

 sandy soil; long trailing, slightly prickly, smooth or smoothish, 

 and with three to seven smaller leaflets than in the foregoing, 

 the racemes of flowers with more leaf-like bracts, the fruit of 

 fewer grains and ripening earlier." 



The R. Ctmeifolius, or Sand Blackberry, is common in 

 the sandy ground and barrens from New Jersey southward ; 

 The R. Trivialis, Southern Low Blackberry, is found in 

 light soils from Virginia southward ; the R. Hispidus is a 

 Running Swamp Blackberry whose long, slender stems creep 

 through low, damp woods and marshes ; the R. Spectabilis 

 produces purple solitary flowers, and grows on the banks of 

 the Columbia River in the far Northwest. Whatever im- 

 provements may originate from these species in the future, 

 they have not as yet, to my knowledge, given us any fine 

 cultivated variety. 



R. Fruticosus is the best-known European species, but 

 neither has it, as far as I can discover, been the source of 

 any varieties worthy of favor. It is said to have a pecuUar 

 flavor, that produces satiety at once. The blackberry, there- 

 fore, is exceptional, in that we have no fine foreign varieties, 

 and Mr. Fuller writes that he cannot find " any practical 

 information in regard to their culture in any European work 

 on gardening." 



The '' bramble " is quite fully treated in Mr. R. Thomp- 

 son's valuable English work, but I find little to interest the 

 American reader. He suggests that the several native spe- 

 cies that he describes are capable of great improvement, but 

 I cannot learn that such effort has ever been made success- 



