confined to the old world, being represented by three 
species in Japan and by two in China. Specimens of one 
of the Chinese species have indeed at times been referred 
to the species here depicted; this identification, it is now 
found, cannot be sustained. One of the most distinct and 
beautiful of hardy trees, P. hispidum grows well at Kew, 
and flowers freely almost every year. When its branches 
are furnished with their long pendent panicles, an example 
of P. hispidum is one of the most effective ornaments of the 
garden, the more so because, flowering as it does in late 
June, it escapes comparison with other trees, equally 
striking, which by then are out of flower. It thrives ina 
good loamy soil and in a sunny situation and, like most 
trees of its class, flowers most abundantly after a hot 
autumn. It hasj never suffered in the least from frost at 
Kew, but it grows to a larger size and more quickly in the 
warmer counties, and the material from which our plate 
has been prepared was derived from a particularly hand- 
some specimen in the garden of Canon Ellacombe at Bitton, 
near Bristol. In the south-west of Ireland there are some 
splendid examples approaching 40 feet in height and more in 
diameter of crown. The species should be raised from seed 
which occasionally ripens in this country and has been 
offered several times in recent years for exchange in the 
Kew seed-list. Japanese nurserymen also offer it at 
moderate rates, but usually under the name of its nearest 
ally, P. corymbosum. The variable character of the under- 
side of the leaves is not due to age, for leaves that are 
finely white tomentose and leaves that are glabrous beneath 
may be found on the same branch. 
DEscRIPTION.— Tree, with glabrous branches and ashy- 
brown bark. Leaves alternate, denticulate 24-8 in. long, 
14-4 in. wide, elliptic, acute or shortly acuminate, base 
cuneate, green above, paler and smooth or in leaves of the 
same age finely white tomentose beneath, the veins pubes- 
cent; petiole 4-1 in. long; stipules 0. Panicles axillary, 
ier Wi. long, 13-2 in. wide, ascending or pendent, 
3-leaved at the base, bractless above, pubescent with 
spreading hairs, their branches spreading, 3-1 in. long, 
2-fureate; flowers somewhat clustered and secund, their 
pedicels 1 lin. long or legs, Calyx obconic, many-nerved, 
