2714
RUBUS plicatus.
Plaited-leaved Bramble.
ICOSANDRIA Polygynia.
Gen. Char. Calyx 5-cleft. Petals 5. Berry superior,
of several single-seeded grains, placed upon
a spongy receptacle.
Spec. Char. Stem not rooting, nearly erect, ob-
soletely angular, smooth, with small, somewhat
curved, uniform prickles. Leaves digitate, of 5
stalked, cordate-ovate, pointed, plicate leaflets,
paler green beneath. Panicle prickly, nearly
simple, corymbose. Calyx slightly reflexed.
Syn. Rubus plicatus. Weihe and Nees Rubi Germ.
jj t. 1.
R. nitidus. Sm. Engl. FI. v. 2. 404.
R. suberectus (3. Borr. in Hook. Brit. FI. 244.
T h e plant before us is not rare in the forest districts of
Sussex, in heathy and somewhat boggy places, chiefly on
the banks of streams. Sir J . E. Smith was misled to give
it as It. nitidus of Weihe and Nees, by the writer of the
present article, who, when the first edition of Hooker’s
British Flora was published, regarded it R. plicatus of the
German authors, but as a mere variety of R. suberectus.
Ihis last opinion also he has been led to abandon by the
remarks of our friend Mr. W. Wilson, who has carefully
availed himself of his opportunities of studying R. suberectus
m its wild state. He confirms the statement of Anderson
and bmith, that the leaves on the young stems of that plant
are often pinnate, and that the truly ripe fruit is not black
but deep red, “ the colour of a ripe Morello cherry.” In
R. plicatus the fruit whilst ripening is, as in R. suberectus,
ot a beautifully bright red; but it is perfectly black when
ripe, and the leaves are never pinnate: the stalks also of the
ower pair of leaflets, although short, are more perceptible
man in R. suberectus-, and these differences, in addition to
tne essential one of curved, not setaceous, and larger and
more numerous, although still small and sparingly scattered,
pncKles, seem to warrant the separation. In R. suberectus