BOTANICON SINICUM. 99 
Japanese appellations of plants, in many instances also Chinese 
names written in Chinese characters. It seems that most of these 
identifications can be traced back to the period of the Chinese 
i T’ang dynasty, for the character T‘ang (Xara in Japanese), 
frequently found in Japanese names of plants, is always used there 
to designate the Chinese origin of a plant. But some Chinese 
names applied now-a-days to Japanese plants occur for the first 
time in the Kiu huang pen ts‘ao, and this proves that Japanese 
botanists subsequent to the time of publication of this work 
(beginning of the 15th century) continued to determine the 
plants of their country from Chinese botanical works. It can be 
said that these identifications of Chinese and Japanese plants 
made by Japanese botanists at different times are correct upon 
the whole, at least as far as the genus is concerned. Sometimes 
the same Chinese name is applied in China and in Japan to 
different species of the same genus, seldom to plants having no 
resemblance to each other. The tree ## ch‘u in Chinese books is 
Ailantus glandulosa; but in Japan where the tree is not found the 
above Chinese character is applied to Huscaphis staphylecides. 
Sieb. et Zuce. fl. Japon. I, 124. We learn from Siebold that the 
inner bark of the root of this Japanese shrub is largely used in 
the country as an efficacious remedy in dysentery, just as the 
inner bark of the root of Ailantus is used by the Chinese.— 
5 46 & Ma sien hao in China is Incarvillea sinensis, not ob- 
served in Japan, where the above Chinese name designates Pedi- 
cularis resupinata. 
The Chinese names of plants given in Japanese botanical works 
together with the popular Japanese names act there the part of 
our scientific botanical names. 
It was in 1709 that the first original Japanese work on Materia 
medica was published by Kaibara Rakuken, with the title 
K Fi AS BH Yamato Honzo, in 18 books. 
A small treatise on Japanese Botany was published about the 
middle of the last century, with the title 7#£ a Hwa mi, by the 
Japanese botanist Yo nan shi, assisted by his pupil Ono Ranzan. 
The Kwa wi comprises eight books, in which 200 plants are 
described. The drawings accompanying the text are not of ahigh — 
