234 CAPRiroLiACE;E. [Vihunium. 



flowering shoots and branches of the cymes mealy, cymes pedun- 

 culate dense convex or hemispherical, flowers all equal and per- 

 fect, fruit ovoid (black). Sm. E. Fl. p. 107. Br. Fl. p. 184. 

 Bab. Man. 141. E. B. v. t. 331. Loud. Arb. Br. ii. 1036, fig. 

 785. Jacq. Fl. Aust. Icon. iv. t. 341. Guimp. und Hayne, Ab- 

 bild der Deutsch. Holtzart. i. 41, t. 31 (optima). 



In dry elevated or rocky woods and lliickets, on bushy hills, banks, and in 

 hedges, also on old walls; abundant wherever the soil is at all calcareous. Fl. 

 May, June. i^r. August, September. Ij. 



E. Med. — Frequent about Byde, as in Quarr copse, about Ashey down, &o. 

 In great abundance amongst the rocks at East-end, and from thence all along the 

 Undercliif. In elevated woods between Shanklin and Bonchurch. Common in 

 Bembridge Island. 



W. Med. — About Newport, Carisbrooke, Gatcombc, Shorwell, Calbourne, Yar- 

 mouth, Sec, in plenty. 



A shrub or small tree, from 4 to 12 feet high or more, rising with several slen- 

 der stems or a single stout one, usually in the wild state of somewhat straggling 

 growth, at other times of more regular and compact form, when old much and 

 irregularly branched, the branches opposite, tough and pliant, straight, at least in 

 young trees and those from the root- suckers, rounded or near the top very 

 obscurely quadrangular, the lowermost occasionally procumbent at the base and 

 ascending; filled with a white spongy pith, clothed towards the summit -and at 

 the extremities of the flowering shoots with dense, grayish, mealy, stellate pubes- 

 cence intermixed with chaffy scaliness, and covered with a smooth reddish or ash- 

 coloured bark, which on the trunk is rough and brownish. Leaves opposite, 

 various in size and shape, sometimes 4 or 5 inches long, mostly from 2 to 3 inches 

 in length and about l^ or 2 inches wide, firm and thickish, deep yellowish green, 

 russet-coloured when young, ovate, roundish ovate or ovato-elliptical, obtuse or 

 rounded, pointed or slightly acuminate, subcordate and often a little unequal at 

 the base, finely, evenly and simply denticulate-serrate, the serratures mucronate, 

 not incurved ; glabrous above or roughish only with a few scattered, very short, 

 stifiF, simple or stellate hairs, and often considerably shining, plicato - rugose ; 

 beneath paler, with very prominent ribs more or less densely clothed with stellate 

 tomentum extending over the entire surface of the leaf. Petioles semiterete, 

 slightly grooved above, but not margined or glandular, about half an inch long, 

 very downy. Stipules none. Cymes terminal or occiisionally in the forks of the 

 uppermost branches, convex or nearly hemispherical, never flat, from 2 or 3 inches 

 to a hand's breadth across, sometimes subtended by a pair of leaves, much com- 

 pounded, of about 6 stout, principal, horizontal, and one central erect division, 

 densely tomentose with short stellate pubescence, and furnished at the bifurcations 

 with linear-lanceolate, deciduous, woolly bracts, that are occasionally leafy at the 

 apex. Flowers numerous, crowded, rather small, white or cream-coloured, in 

 gardens sometimes tinged red externally, somewhat unpleasantly scented, all 

 equal and perfect. Calyx minute, greenish, with very obtuse segments. Corolla 

 glabrous, deeply 5 -cleft, with oblong rounded segments, the tube very short. 

 Anthers and their globular pollen pale yellow. Styles extremely short, nearly 

 obsolete. Fruit densely clustered, roundish or ovoid, slightly compressed, 3 or 4 

 lines in length, at first bright scarlet and shining, bluish black and juicy when 

 quite ripe. Nucleus grayish, broadly elliptical, nearly orbicular, much flattened, 

 with mostly 2 longitudinal furrows on one side and 3 on the other. 



This shrub is much cultivated in gardens at Hyde ; when, as Loudon remarks, 

 in good free soil, it forms a handsome, durable, small tree, 18 or 20 feet in height, 

 commending itself by its large broad leaves and ample hemispheres of white 

 flowers, succeeded by a no less brilliant display in the glowing and polished clus- 

 ters of its half-ripened fruit. These, when fully mature, have a bitterish sweet 

 taste, not unpleasant, and, though somewhat mawkish and scarcely worth eating, 



