BERBERIS 233 



with pollen grains, carries them away to another flower and deposits them 

 on the pistil. 



As ornamental shrubs the barberries have many good qualities, and 

 several of them, like B. Aquifolium, Darwinii, aristata, stenophylla, are in 

 the very first rank of garden plants. They prefer a warm, loamy soil, but 

 are by no means fastidious. Seeds are, as a rule, freely borne, and 

 afford the best and readiest means of propagation; but for those sorts 

 which do not produce seed in this country, and for those also that 

 do not come true from seed like the coloured-leaved varieties, cuttings, 

 layers or division of the plants must be resorted to. Cuttings should be 

 made of fairly ripened wood, and put in sandy soil under a bell-glass or 

 in cold frames. 



The genus Berberis is one of the most troublesome to study, owing 

 to the variability of the species and the difficulty of finding reliable 

 characters to keep some of them apart. There is no genus of shrubs 

 into which the irresponsible and careless maker of species has introduced 

 more confusion than this. There are two leading groups, as follows : 



1. MAHONIA. Invariably evergreen; leaves pinnate, no spines on 

 the branches. 



2. BERBERIS (proper). Leaves simple, arranged in tufts ; branches 

 spiny. These may be divided into (a) evergreen, and (b] deciduous ; and 

 again separated according to the arrangement of the flowers; whether 

 racemose, umbellate, fasciculate, or solitary. 



The morphology of the leaves and spines of barberry is interesting. 

 In the true barberry group, the "leaf," as we call it, is really the terminal 

 leaflet of a pinnate leaf, the side ones of which are suppressed, and the 

 tuft of leaves as a whole is a branch in which the internodes are 

 suppressed. Then the spines (usually three-parted, but sometimes simple, 

 sometimes much divided), in the axil of which the tuft of leaves is borne, 

 is a metamorphosed pinnate leaf. An occasional reversion to the ancestral 

 type reveals their true origin. 



B. ACTINACANTHA, Martins. 

 (Bot. Reg., vol. 31, t. 5.) 



A deciduous shrub, 3 ft. or sometimes more high, with rigid, crooked 

 branchlets. The spines are very variable, some being the ordinary three-forked 

 ones, so common in the genus ; others are curiously flat and leaf-like, semi- 

 circular or heart-shaped, the margins cut up into several long, triangular, spiny 

 teeth. The spines on barberries, as has already been observed, are really 

 modified leaves, and there is no species which shows their foliate character 

 better than this. Leaves hard, rigid, not downy ; variable in shape, and 

 either obovate, oblong, "or roundish ; to i ins. long, with a few large spiny 

 teeth. Flowers sweetly fragrant, produced in short umbels or clusters, deep 

 yellow, in. across. Fruit blue-black, \ in. long. 



This remarkable barberry, common enough in a wild state on the mountains 

 of Chile, and often introduced to cultivation, is still comparatively rare. It 

 does not flower freely, and seldom produces fruit. It is well adapted for a 

 sunny spot on the rockery, but has more scientific interest than horticultural 

 value. 



