83 



of which is that it was discovered by a traveler in the mountains 

 of Ho-nan, but no .wild moutans are now found on these moun- 

 tains. Another legend is that the Chinese produced the tree peony 

 from the herbaceous species by skilful handling. This seems 

 within the range of possibility when we consider how analogous 

 the woody stems of P. moutaii are to the prolongations of the fleshy 

 roots of the herbaceous sorts ; but when once we consider the leaves 

 and other characters, the extreme improbability of this origin is 

 clearly evident. 



The fact that the early shipments from the East arrived in such 

 bad condition was due to two causes : th^ long time taken for the 

 voyage, caused by the slow rate of the ship ; and ignorance as to 

 how to pack them. " H. P." in The Garden, 1893, page 127, states 

 that by that time the Japanese had learned to pack the peonies so 

 they would carry to England in almost perfect condition, and that 

 the auction rooms in London were often crowded with boxes of 

 tree peonies from Japanese nurseries. In the English horticul- 

 tural literature of the eighties, many references are found to 

 " Whitsun Roses," this being the popular term by which the tree 

 peony was known in the English trade at that time. 



History of the Herbaceous Peonies 



I. Pceonia albifloya, Pallas. 



The Chinese author. Hung King, in 536, distinguished two sorts 

 of herbaceous peonies, the white and the red. At this time the 

 herbaceous peony was fairly well distributed over the country. It 

 was used for medicinal purposes, and in some provinces even for 

 food. It was called Sho Yo, meaning " most beautiful." Mas Ze, 

 an author on natural philosophy, also wrote of the herbaceous 

 peonies in 968 A. D. In the early part of the eleventh century, 

 according to Soo Sung, this Sho Yo plant was distributed all over 

 China, but the most valuable roots came from the country of 

 Hwae Gan Foo. By 1086, according to the botanist Chin Ching, 

 the nurserymen and florists were waking up to the possibilities of 

 this plant for ornamental purposes, and were beginning by ex- 

 traordinary diligence and powerful manures to produce flowers of 

 very large size. As a result of this heavy manuring, and the 

 continual planting of seeds, new and better varieties sprang up very 

 rapidly; and according to Le She Chin in 1596, at least thirty 

 improved varieties were listed in the Chinese nurserymen's cata- 

 logs. 



