14-0 Mr. Winch's Observations on his Flora. 



is another class of Botanists more injurious than these, they too are 

 generally men who set their faces against any increase of genera, but 

 who, at the same time, consider that the most trifling difference in a 

 leaf, a serrature, or a hair, should constitute a specific distinction : and 

 to such an extravagant pitch is this system now carried in certain ge- 

 nera — take Rosa, Rubus, Salix, Myosotis, no two persons are or can 

 be agreed on what constitutes a species and what not, in such tribes. 

 The consequence is, that all sober-minded Botanists will have nothing 

 to do with these genera, and the crazy ones have each their own ideas 

 as to species. You and I may set our faces against these species-mon- 

 gers, but it is to no purpose." 



But as the native Roses, with which this district abounds in a remark- 

 able degree, contribute greatly to the beauty of our woodland scenery 

 and hedge-rows, it may be worth while to inquire into the cause of the dif- 

 ficulty which attends the defining the species of such conspicuous flowers. 

 That there is difficulty in the task we may be assured of, for Woods, 

 an indefatigable Botanist, in his paper published by the Linnaean Society, 

 in the 12th vol. of their Transactions, enumerates no less than twenty 

 British species, while Lindley, who bestowed no less pains on the same 

 subject, in his Rosarum Monographia reduced their numbers to twelve. 

 The difference of opinion, existing between these acute Botanists, must 

 be accounted for by those marks which generally afford permanent specific 

 distinctions in other plants, such as the roughness or smoothness of their 

 leaves, the form of the prickles, whether the segments of the calyx be 

 simple or divided, or the leaves be singly or doubly serrated being of 

 small avail in this genus. To these must be added, the almost insur- 

 mountable difficulty that the various species or varieties pass by insen- 

 sible degrees into each other, and though at first sight, no two Roses 

 may appear more dissimilar than Rosa canina on the one hand, and 

 Rosa villosa on the other, yet links can easily be furnished to form a 

 complete chain between them. Rosa canina is well known as a robust 

 growing bush, with hooked prickles, smooth oval fruit and shining 

 leaves. In Rosa sarmentacea the plant becomes slender in habit, and 

 with us its leaves generally assume a glaucous hue. Rosa Fo?'steri 



