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Adrian Hardy Haworth's description of Cactus strictus (Haworth) Haworth in Miscellanea Naturalia,
p. 188. No. 20, 1803.
20. Cactus strictus. Cactus, compressed, enounced with distinct long-reaching, erect articulations,
segments ovate-elliptic, spines uniformly short.
Habitat.... Shrub (Perennial).
Description. Stem erect, spiny, fleshy, articulated, branched, and by way of age becoming woody.
Every branch in like manner articulated and erect. Every segment ovate-elliptic, green, fleshy and
spinose. Immature segments leafy. Spines in bunches, uniformly short, or scarsely linear. Leaves as
in twos [i.e. opposite sides of imature cladode?] precede (them). Flowers not seen.
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Adrian Hardy Haworth's description of Opuntia stricta (Haworth) Haworth, in Synopsis Plantarum
Succulentarum, 191. 1812.
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** PARVISPINOSAE. It has diminutive spines, ovate articulations, spines numerous, uniformly
piliform, [repeated as] many lengths of string.
7. O. stricta (Oval upright) It has erect segments, ovate-elliptic, with spines uniformly numerous and
short. - Cactus strictus. Of ours in misc. nat. p. 188. - Cactus Opuntia inermis. Plant. grass [i.e. herb].
cum icone.
Habitat ....
S. Shrub (perennial).
Floret ....
Cultivated before 1796.
Stem erect, bristling with spines, fleshy, branched, at length finally becoming woody [i.e. through the
course of time?]. Branches segmented, erect. Segments green, fleshy, spiny, immature segments
leafy. Spines in bunches (tufted), scarsely linear. Leaves when in them precede them. Flowers not
seen.
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Augustin Pyramus de Candolle's description of Opuntia inermis (DC.) DC., in Prodromus Systematis
Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis 3: 473, No. 27, 1828.
27. O. inermis, tightly compressed erect, segmented, fleshy, ovate-elliptic, spines uniformly very
short, hair-like, extremely numerous. Perennial shrub. In America of warm climate. Cactus Opuntia
inermis DC. pl. grass [i.e. herb]. n. 138. cum tab. Cactus strictus Haw. misc. 188. non Willd. Opuntia
stricta Haw. syn. 191. Flowers on both sides yellow, patent (i.e. "spreading", as do the branches of a
tree; particularly at an angle of 26-45 degrees). (v.v.)
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Ker Gawler, in Edwards, Bot. Reg. 3: pl. 255. 1818
CACTUS Dillenii.
The Eltham Indian-Fig.
ICOSANDRIA MONOGYMA.
Nat. ord. Cacti. Jussieu gen. 310. Div. II. Petala et stamina indefinita.
CACTUS. Supra vol. 2.fol. 137.
Div. Opuntiae, compressae articulis proliferis. C. Dillenii, erectus; articulis frugiferis obovatosubrotundis, glaucis, spinarum validarum flavicantium fasciculis divaricatis et penicillo setoso-piloso
baseos pluries longioribus; germine penicillis nonnullis vagis in summitate, breviore corolla: stigmate
sexlobo.
Tuna major, spinis validis flavicantibus flore sulphureo. Dillen. elth. 398. t.296. fig.382.
Frutex pinguis, compressus, articulato-ramosus, 4-6-pedalis v. ultra, erectus, glaucus. Flores pauci in
margine superiore articulorum terminalium, sulphurei, concolores, diametro subquadriunciali. Stylus
albus.
English Translation: Div. Opuntiae, compressed segments abundantly extending. C. Dillenii, erect;
each segment fertile, obovate to nearly round, glaucous, spines stout, golden-yellow, in tufts,
bristles spreading and [as of a pen brush] bristly-hairy, gently touching numerous times at length;
fresh bud sprouts [as of a hair pencil] with bristles, several vagrant in upper part, corolla short:
stigmas six-lobed.
Tuna major, spines stout, golden-yellow, flower sulphur yellow. Dillen. elth. 398. t.296. fig.382.
Shrub, rotund, compressed, articulately branched, 4-6 foot, rarely more, erect, glaucous. Flowers
few in the margin on terminus of upper segments, of yellow sulphur colour, concolorous [i.e. the
same throughout], a diameter below four inches. Style white.
Note: The upper articulations of the stem of this plant differ from those in Tuna, by being nearly as
broad as long, and of an oblately cuneate or rather oblately obovate form; the flower is of one
colour, not red on the outside, as there, and considerably larger; the germen has setaceous pencils
or small tufts only at the upper part of the germen, and not scattered over the whole. It flowered in
the celebrated garden at Eltham before 1732, and was represented hy Dillenius, in his Hortus
Elthamensis, but the figure has not been applied by Linnaeus to any species, We see no reason for
supposing it a variety of Tuna. Calling a plant a variety may serve to shuffle off the task of expressing
near distinctions, but when said without the proof of experience or analogy, and in the face of
difference, should have little weight. It is indeed a safe assertion, for he who makes it can never be
shown to be in the wrong; a danger to which the opposite assertion may be subject to the end of
time. But then a species that stands reputed as the variety of another, is a whole race falsified on the
records of science; and, as varieties are ever less anxiously attended to than species, a race exposed
to the chance of being entirely overlooked.
The drawing was made from a plant in the collection of Mr. Vere, at Kensington Gore. It was
about four feet high, and had never been known to flower before. We believe it to be one that has
been very seldom seen in bloom in this country, if ever, since the time of Dillenius. It is not figured in
Monsieur Decandolle's work on Succulent Plants. The flower was entirely decayed before we could
find an opportunity of inspecting it for description.
The following version of the character of Cactus Opuntia (in which Tuna, and many other apparently
distinct species, have been included as varieties of each other) from Monsieur Decandolle's work
may serve as an outline of the more general characteristics of the species of the division of the
genus to which our plant belongs.
Stem flattened, jointed, joints sometimes ovate, sometimes oval, sometimes oblong, obtuse,
lower ones ash-coloured, somewhat woody, nearly cylindrical, and scarcely separated at the
junctures, upper ones herbaceous, fleshy, beset with tubercles disposed in a quincuncial order [i.e.
an arrangement of about five leaves in a kind of spiral, each leaf separated about two fifths of a
circle from the next, so as to form a regular pattern of swirling rows that can go in various directions;
but on the summit of fresh segments sometimes overlapping]; from every tubercle are produced
short pencils of thick hair or bristles, and fascicles of long thorns, which are either setaceous or
subulate, white or yellow, hard, sharp-pointed, and prove abortive in various proportions. Leaves
issuing out at the tubercles below the thorns, one to each tubercle, shaped like those of the Stonecrop, caducous, small, round, pointed, green or slightly purpled. Flowers from the upper edge of the
terminal joints, solitary or many together, large, yellow, sessile. Calyx growing on the crown of the
germen, divided into many leaflets at the top: leaflets flat, ovately round, resembling the outer
petals and scarcely distinct from them. Petals of the corolla longer than the calycine leaflets,
standing upon the calyx or the margin of the germen, for we may express it which way we will, in
several ranks, cuneate, obtuse, sometimes emarginate, the middle nerve terminating in a short
mucro or dagger-point. Stamens numerous, inserted at the same point as the petals, in several rows.
Filaments filiform, upright, long: anthers inserted at the base, oval, yellow, bilocular: pollen yellow.
Germen inferior or connate with the calyx, turbinate, green on the outside, beset with pencilled
thorny turbercles like the stem. Style white, upright, thicker above the base, tapered at the top,
generally hollow, cylindrical: stigmas 8-9- (in the present species 6-)rayed, thick, viscous, obtuse.
Berry (something like a fig, whence the English name of " Indian-fig") fleshy, ovoid, large, purple,
one-celled, with an ovate polyspermous loculament: seeds numerous, small, affixed round about to
the wall of the loculament, brown, reniform or kidney-shaped.
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Opuntia dillenii (Ker Gawler) Haw. Suppl. Pl. Succ., 79, 1819.
2. O. Dillenii. (Dillenian) erect; each segment fertile, obovate to nearly round, glaucous [i.e. ice-like,
sparkling (as in sun), grayish surface], with spines stout [strong, robust], golden-yellow, in tufts,
spreading, and [of a hair pencil] bristly, gently touching numerous times at length; fresh bud sprouts
[as a hair pencil] with bristles, several vagrant in upper part, corolla short: stigmas six-lobed.
Cactus Dillenii. Bot. regist. 255.
Tuna major, spines stout, golden-yellow, flower sulphur yellow. Dill. elth. 2. 398. t. 296. f. 382.
Opuntiae Tunae, Beta. Of ours (Synops. succ. 188.) related to, but by no means the same.
Habitat....
Floret. Oct.
D.S. Shrub (Perennial).
Cultivated. All the way from Dom. Sherrard in renowned garden Elthamensi. Into this garden
produced in abundance regularly, in which place spring into being erect, strong [enduring,
sustainable], multiple branches to 5 feet; and tasteless dark-blood coloured fruits, and flowers every
year brought forth.
Observations. The able author of the Botanical Register has done well indeed in separating this
noble Opuntia from the Cactus Tuna of Linnaeus: and his very sound remarks theron are worthy of
enduring for ever.
"Calling a plant a variety [as he truly says] may serve to shuffle off the task of expressing
near distinctions (italics), but when said without the proof of experience (italics), or (no italics)
analogy (italics), and in the (no ital) face of difference (itls), should have little weight.
"_______ a species that stands reputed as the variety of another, is (no its) a whole race
falsified (italics) on the (no italics) records of science (italics); and, as varieties are ever less anxiously
attended to than species - a race exposed to the chance of being entirely overlooked." (not italics)
Botan. regist. l. c. (italics).
Had but this author always written thus, O then that lovely plant [Scilla siberica, nobis in Bot. rep.
365.-Scilla amoena (Beta.) siberica. Bot. magaz. 1025] which blooms the first of all our hardy bulbs,
and lasts three months in beauty, had shone with a lustre more resplendent than ever. And its whole
race would not only have escaped falsification on the records of science; but the still more
humiliating circumstance of being stigmatized with the epithet of "a florist's sort." Although to me,
when a boy, it did actually come as such only, from the inimitable cultivators of flowery Haarlem,
above thirty years ago.