brides. All the figures, except that of the leaves of 8, were
drawn from cultivated plants, of which those of a. and y.
had been removed by Mr. Forster from Epping Forest to
his garden.
Our «. is a small straggling shrub, with branches sometimes
procumbent, sometimes rising a foot or two from the
ground. Young twigs downy ; the pubescence appressed
upwards. Leaves on short stalks, thin, somewhat waved,
flat, or slightly carinate, somewhat rugose, with veins
sunken above and prominent beneath; the primordial ones
obtuse, the rest acute, with a short recurved and often
oblique point, the largest, even on strong shoots, rarely an
inch in length; upper surface either almost naked, darkish-
green and rather shining, or grey-green, or even hoary, from
the varying quantity of the appressed pubescence; underside
also sometimes almost bare, and then glaucous, but
more usually furnished, often very copiously, with appressed
silky or cottony hairs; edges more or less recurved, crenate
and toothed, the teeth sometimes, especially in male plants,
distant and indistinct. Stipules minute, except on strong
shoots, where they are half-ovate or half-cordate, sessile or
on short stalks, slightly vaulted, with a few gland-tipped
serratures, or more rarely entire, their point nearly straight,
acute. Catkins cylindrical, scarcely more than half an inch
long whilst in flower, occasionally almost sessile, but usually
on a stalk of nearly half their,length, with about five small,
silky floral leaves, which are mostly oval and obtuse, but
sometimes narrower and more pointed. Flowers close-set
at first, but soon becoming loose in the female catkins.
Calyx-scale thin, pale, oblong, rounded, and tinged with
red or brown at the point, covered more or less closely with
long silky hairs. Nectary single, exterior, oblong or linear,
truncate. Stamens two. Germen ovate-lanceolate, white
with dense, silky, appressed hairs; its stalk hairy, at first
short, but as the flowering advances often equalling or exceeding
the calyx-scale. Style in general scarcely perceptible,
sometimes a little lengthened. Stigmas pale, often
reddish, short, thick, connivent, at length cloven. The
flowers appear before the leaves, or when these are but
beginning to burst forth, about the end of April.
S. ambigua approaches on the one side to S. aurita, with
the smallest varieties of which it is most liable to be confounded,
and on the other to S. fusca-, differing from the
former by its less rugose, less vaulted, and less distinctly
serrated leaves, and their more delicate texture and less
woolly pubescence, and the smaller, flatter, and less oblique
stipules; from the latter by its less silvery pubescence, and
the more uneven upper surface of its leaves, and their more
prominent veins beneath, as well as by some minute characters
in the flowers. Koch regards it as a hybrid between
the two.
It varies much in the procumbent, ascending, or more
erect mode of growth, in the paler or darker brown tinge of
the twigs, and in the quantity of pubescence. S. spathulata
of Willdenow, which we now fully concur with our friend
Prof. Hooker in regarding as a mere variety, scarcely differs
but in the narrower base of the leaf. The style has been
supposed to be longer; but its length in both varieties seems
to vary a little from accidental circumstances The |3. of
Hooker’s British Flora has a silvery appearance, from the
abundance of silky hairs which clothe the leaves, especially
beneath. It is said by Mr. T. Drummond, who found it on
bogs near Forfar, to be of upright growth, and 3 or 4
feet high. Our /3., although much less silky, probably differs
from situation only. It was found on heathy ground at
Hopton, Suffolk, and attains, in the garden, the height of
5 feet. It scarcely differs from «., except in the erect growth,
and the greater size of all its parts. The referring of
S. proteifolia of Sal. Woburn, to this variety is found to bfe
erroneous. S. versifolia of Seringe appears from his specimens
to belong to it; but whether S. versifolia of Wahlen-
berg is, as Seringe thought, (notwithstanding the long style
and some other discrepancies,) the same, we have no means
of deciding : Koch thinks it rather, according to Walilen