98 THE GRAPES OF NEW YORK. 



" The most obvious characters which distinguish the grape vines of 

 America from those of the old continent are : i . The berries of all the Ameri- 

 can species and varieties that I have seen, approach the figure of an oblate 

 spheroid; that is, the poles are flattened, and the transverse diameter is 

 longer than the polar: however, I have observed that Alexander's grape, 

 and some of the bul or bullet grapes, approach nearer to an oval or ellipsis 

 which is the figure of all foreign or European grapes that I have seen; viz. 

 a prolate spheroid. 2. Most of the American species and varieties have a 

 glaucous and yellowish pubescence on the under surface of their leaves. 

 3. All that I have observed in the northern and eastern districts of the 

 United States are polygamous; i. e. those vines which bear fruit (female) 

 have hermaphrodite flowers (pentandria monogynia) ; but the males have 

 only five stamina, without any female organ, and are always barren. One 

 should suppose, from Walter so strongly marking this character as to 

 induce him to place the Vitis in the class Dioecia, when Linnaeus and the 

 other European botanists had placed it in Pentandria (he himself being an 

 European) , that all the grape vines of the old continent are hermaphroditous 

 and Pentandrian. I know not from my own observation, whether the bull- 

 grape of Carolina is hermaphroditous or dioecious, and therefore rest satisfied 

 with Walter's assertion." Bartram gives four species. 



Nuttall,' in his Genera of North American Plants and Catalogue of the 

 Species, gives a rather stereotyped description of the genus but in addition 

 in fine type he gives the following: 



" Leaf simple and cordate, angularly or sinuately lobed, rarely digitate 

 or pinnate (Cissus?), flowers numerous, in compound racemes, not uncom- 



' Thomas Xuttall was born in Settle in Yorkshire, England, in 17S6. He migrated to the United 

 States in 1807, making his home in Philadelphia where he became acquainted with William Bartram 

 and Dr. Barton. It was largely owing to the influence of these men that he turned his attention 

 to botany. Xuttall was an extensive traveler and made botanical expeditions into jnany parts of the 

 country. He explored the Middle West up to the Rocky Mountains and made a trip around the Horn 

 to California. From 1825 to 1834 he was connected with Harvard College. In 1S42 he was called to 

 England by a bequest from an uncle left to him conditional on his residing for nine months of each 

 year in England; compliance with this request caused a cessation of his botanical work in America. 

 He died at Nutgrove, Lancashire, in 1859. Nuttall's first and probably greatest work was his Genera 

 of North American Plants and Catalogue of the Species, published in 1S18. Besides various accounts 

 of his expeditions he made an addition of three volumes to Michaux's Syh\i bringing that work up 

 to six volumes. 



