tion; the twigs often opposite, straight, smooth and polished,
yellowish-grey, tinged but slightly or not at all with red,
except in their tender growing state ; the bark, as in the
other monandrous species, of a bright lemon-yellow within.
Leaves destitute of pubescence, except a deciduous woolliness
which invests them when they first expand; of a pale
light green as in S. Helix, less glaucescent than those of S.
Lambertiana, which they more resemble in length and shape,
but so tapering to the base, and so widened upwards, as to
be often almost wedge-shaped, especially on strong shoots,
and contracted rather abruptly to a sharp often twisted
point; their edges flat, minutely serrated, chiefly at the
widest part, with small, incurved, glandular teeth. Female
catkins alternate or opposite, on short, stout, woolly stalks,
with 2 or 3 small, recurved, silky, bracteal leaves : they are
about 1^ inch long, ascending, often curved or waved,
cylindrical, obtuse, very soft, of numerous flowers, which,
as usual in the monandrous Willows, spread almost horizontally.
Calyx-scales concave, short, oblong, rounded, silky
within and without, pale in the lower, black in the upper
half. Nectary single, small, pale. Germen as long as the
calyx-scale, woolly, with closely appressed hairs. Style
short, thick, at first scarcely perceptible. Stigmas short,
rounded, slightly notched, pale, with a yellow or reddish
tinge whilst in perfection. We are unacquainted with the
male flowers; but it cannot be doubted that they have a
single filament and a 4-lobed anther.
The style is more perceptible than in S. Lambertiana, and
the catkins are twice as large, less crowded with florets, and
much softer; more resembling in appearance, but not in the
stigma, those of S. Eorbyana. There is much reason to
believe that a female catkin of the last-named species is
figured for that of S. Helix in Engl. Bot. t. 1343.
Whether S. Helix, S. Woollgariana, S. Lambertiana, and
a fourth Willow which the late Mr. Anderson regarded as
S. amnicola of Walker should be held truly distinct, or
mere seminal varieties of one species, is a question on which
botanists will continue to differ in opinion, and which, we
may venture to affirm, no one is qualified to decide. ^ S.
purpurea, few who know it will hesitate to distinguish.
Hoffmann professedly united it with S. Helix under his S.
monandra f but perhaps, as Sir J. E. Smith has suggested,
he was not really acquainted with S. purpurea.—W. B.