CHAP. cr.

COBYLACEiE. «UE'rCUS.

1849

acute, entire. Stipules shorter than the footstalks. Calyx of thefruit hemispherical, bristly. {Smith.) Sir J. E. Smith observes thatthis tree is “ generally mistaken for Q. Cerris, from which nothing canbe more certainly distinct;” we admit their distinctness, but no onewho has seen the two trees together in the Horticultural Society’sGarden can, we think, doubt their being only different forms of thesame species. This variety is a native of Austria, Hungary, Carniola,Italy, and other parts of the south of Europe, in stony mountainousplaces. It forms the common oak of the indigenous woods inthe neighbourhood of Vienna, where it is considered by M. Ro-senthal, an excellent practical botanist, as nothing more than avariety of Q. Cerris. The tree from which our portrait is takenis in the arboretum of the London Horticultural Society. In theUniversity Botanic Garden at Vienna there is a tree, 60 years planted,which is 40 ft. high.

Y Q. C. 5 cana major; Q. cana majorLodd.Cat.,e d. 1836 („/?g.l609.);thehoary-leaved bitter,or Tur' ey, Oak; ^resembles Q. austriaca in the formof its leaves; but they are muchmore downy beneath. There is avigorous-growing handsome tree ofthis variety in the arboretum ofMessrs. Loddiges, which, in 1836,was 35 ft. high. The name cana(hoary) was originally given to thisvariety in the Hammersmith Nur-sery, but whence the tree was ob-tained is uncertain.

If Q. C. 6 cana minor, Q. cana minor Lodd. Cat., ed. 1836, resembles thepreceding kind, but has narrower leaves. There is a tree at Messrs.Loddiges’s, 25 ft. high.

¥ Q. C. 7 Ragnal; Q. Signal Lodd. Cat., ed. 1836. The Ragnal Oak.— This variety has rather narrower and more deeply cut leavesthan Q. C. cana major; but, in other respects, scarcely differs fromthat variety. It is a tree of remarkably vigorous growth; but wehave only seen one plant, which is in the arboretum of Messrs.Loddiges. Miller mentions a large tree of this variety growing atRagnal, near Tuxford, in Nottinghamshire, “ which makes a mostelegant appearance; the leaves being shaped like those of the commonoak, but ash-coloured underneath, which renders it very beautiful.It produces acorns, some years, in great plenty; but, unless theautumns prove favourable, they do not ripen so as to grow.” {Mill.Diet., ed. 3., App., No. 12.) We have written to a number of per-sons in Nottinghamshire respecting the Ragnal Oak; and we findthat the tree was cut down upwards of 50 years ago, but what be-came of the timber is unknown. There are trees bearing the nameof the Ragnal oak in the plantations at Welbeck Abbey, of whichHis Grace the Duke of Portland has kindly sent us specimens;but, as the plants have probably been seedlings, they are very dif-ferent in foliage from the tree bearing the same name at Messrs.Loddiges’s. There was a tree of the Ragnal oak for many years inthe Fulham Nursery; but the late Mr. Whitley, a very short timebefore his death in 1835, told Mr. Osborne, jun., that it had died afew years before. Judging from the trees at Messrs. Loddiges’s, wehave no hesitation in saying that Q. C. cana major and minor, andQ. C. Ragnal, are merely slight variations of the same form. Theyall differ, however, from the Fulham oak, and from what is calledthe old Lucombe oak, in not being in the slightest degree sub-