ARBUTUS, a genus of plants of the natural order ericece. containing a number of species, small trees and shrubs, the greater part of which are American. The fruit is fleshy, 5-celled, meny-seeded, usually dotted with little projections, whence that of some species has a sort of resemblance to strawberries; the corolla is U' nedo, the STRAWBERRY TREE, is a native of the south of Europe, found 'also in Asia and America, and in one locality in the British isles, the lakes of Killarney, where its fine foliage adds much to the charm of the scenery. It requires protection in winter in the climate of Paris. In Britain, it is often planted as an ornamental evergreen. It grows to the height of 20 to 30 feet but is rather a great bush than a tree. The bark is rugged; the leaves oblongo-lanceolate, smooth and shining, bluntly serrated; the flowers nodding, large, greenish white; the fruit globose, of a scarlet color, with a vapid sweetish taste. It is, however, sometimes eaten. Of late, excellent alcohol has been made from it in Italy. A wine is made from it in Corsica, which, however, is narcotic, if taken in con siderable quantity, as the fruit itself is, if • eaten too freely. The bark and leaves are astringent—A. andrachne is also sometimes cultivated as an ornamental plant in Britain, but is impatient of severe frosts. Its fruit, and that of A. integrifolia, are eaten in Greece and the east. But all the species seem to possess narcotic qualities in greater or less degree; the fruit of A. furens, a small shrub, a native of Chili, so much as to cause aculeata, which abounds at cape Horn and on Staten island, is an elegant and most pleasing evergreen, very much resembling the myrtle. It grows to the height
of 3 or 4 feet, and produces small white flowers, followed by a profusion of red shining berries, which ornament the bush during winter. Their flavor is insipid, but somewhat astringent. Mixed with a few raisins, they have been made by voyagers into tolerable tarts. A. ura ursi, now generally called arctostaphylos Ina ursi, the IZED BEARBERRY, is a small trailing evergreen shrub, common in the Highlands of Scotland and in the Hebrides, and indeed in the northern parts of Europe, Siberia, and North America. It grows in dry, heathy, and rocky places. The flowers are in small crowded terminal racemes, of a beautiful rose color. The berries are austere and mealy; they are said to form a principal part of the food of bears in northern regions. Grouse also feed on them. The dried leaves are used as an astringent and tonic medicine, and as such have a place in the pharmacopoeias, being principally employed in chronic affections of the bladder; but those of raccinium rills idaa are often fraudulently substituted for them.— The BLACK BEARBERRY (A. or arctostaphylos alpina) is also a native of the northern parts of the globe, a small trailing; shrub, with black berries about the size of a sloe, relished by some, but having a peculiar taste, which to others is disagreeable. The plant is found on many of the Highland mountains of Scotland.