PYRUS [continued) 



In our Article in Vol. I. pp. 141-170, the genus Pyrus has been defined, and some 

 of the sections have been fully described. In this concluding part, an account will 

 be given of the apples, pears, and mountain ashes, which constitute three sections 

 of the genus. 



SECTION PYROPHORUM 



This section of the genus Pyrus comprises the true pears, which are deciduous 

 trees or shrubs, with branchlets of two kinds, long shoots and short shoots, the latter 

 spur-like and often ending in thorny points. Leaves simple, stalked, scattered on 

 the long shoots, clustered on the spurs ; in the bud rolled inwards towards the 

 midrib. Flowers perfect, in corymbs on the short shoots ; sepals five, usually persistent 

 on the apex of the fruit, occasionally deciduous ; ovary usually five-celled, rarely two- 

 or three-celled ; styles five, rarely two or three ; fruit turbinate or sub-globose, with 

 granular flesh. 



The true pears comprise about sixteen species, natives of Europe, northern 

 Africa, and extra-tropical Asia. The following synopsis gives a brief account of 

 the wild species which are in cultivation : 



I. Leaves deeply cut into small segments. 



1. Pyrus heterophylla, Regel and Schmalhausen, in Act. Hort. Petropol. v. 



pt. ii. 581 (1878). 



A small thorny tree, with glabrous branchlets. Leaves very remarkable, 

 about 2 in. long, glabrous, deeply and pinnately cut to near the midrib into 

 about five variously lobed and serrate narrow segments. Fruit depressed- 

 globose, about 1 in. in diameter. 



This occurs in mountain valleys at high elevations in Turkestan. It is 

 represented at Kew by a straggling bush about 3 ft. high. 



II. Leaves sharply serrate, the serrations ending in long slender points. 



2. Pyrus sinensis, Lindley, in Trans. Hort. Soc. vi. 397 (1826), and Bot. Reg. t. 



1248 (1829). 



Pyrus ussuriensis, 1 Maximowicz, Prim. Fl. Amur. 102 (1859). 

 Pyrus Simonii, 2 Carrtere, in Rev. Hort. 1872, p. 28. 



1 This is the Manchurian pear, which is said by Ascherson and Graebner, op. cit. 60, to be the earliest of all pears 

 to flower in the Berlin Botanic Garden, where it was raised from seed sent by Maximowicz. 



2 Sent to the Jardin des Plantes at Paris by Simon in 1 861. This is considered by Bretschneider, Hist. Europ. Bot. 

 Disc. China, 830 (1898), to be a cultivated variety, the Fai-li of north China, which bears delicious apple-shaped fruit of 

 a pale yellow colour. 1 



1556 



