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THE AMERICAN NATURALIST [Vol. XLII 



some reproductions, but at last, by a greater difference 

 of soil, of climate, and of treatment, are either lost or 

 changed. When the different cabbage species receive 

 the same treatment in the same climate, they continue 

 to be frequently reproduced, without changing their ap- 

 pearance. But we can not on this account maintain, that 

 cauliflower would retain the same favorite form in very 

 different climates, and under a complete change of treat- 

 ment. It at last changes so much, that it can scarcely 

 be distinguished from the common cabbage. This, there- 

 fore, is a subspecies. Varieties again do not retain 

 their forms during reproduction. The variable colors 

 —the very variable taste, and other properties of the 

 kitchen vegetables, the ornamental plants, and the fruit- 

 trees, show what varieties are; and the scientific botan- 

 ist must therefore be particularly attentive to distinguish 

 permanent species from the variable subspecies, degen- 

 erate plants and varieties. 



To this discrimination belongs, above all things, a 

 careful, continued, and unprejudiced observation of the 

 whole vegetation of the same plant during its different 

 ages, and amidst the most different circumstances which 

 have an influence on it. When, for instance, in the com- 

 mon Lotus conticulatus, on whatever soil it may grow, 

 we uniformly observe that it has a solid stem, even and 

 erect divisions of the calyx, and expanded filaments, we 

 must of necessity distinguish, as a particular species 

 from it, another form which grows in bogs and in watery 

 meadows, which has a much higher, and always hollow 

 stalk, the divisions of its calyx spread out into a star- 

 shape and hairy, and which has uniformly thin fila- 

 ments; and we must name this latter species either Lotus 

 idiginosus with Schkuhr, or Lotus major with Scopoli 

 and Smith. As, on the other hand, the Pimpinella Saxi- 

 fnif/u grows sometimes quite smooth, and sometimes in 

 woods and shady meadows, considerably hairy; as it 

 . displays sometimes simple and small stem-leaves, some- 

 times half and even doubly pinnated leaves ; and as these 



