19231 WILSON, THE RHODODENDRONS OF NORTHEASTERN ASIA 49 



late, pubescent without on basal half, 5-lobed, lobes spreading almost 

 horizontally from the short tube, rounded, waved; stamens 10, filaments 

 color of corolla, villose on lower half, anthers nearly black; pistil longer 

 than stamens, ovary green, conic, furrowed, densely lepidote, style crimson, 

 curved, stigma small, dark-colored. Fruit oblong, 0.8-1.2 cm. long, fur- 

 rowed, lepidote; seeds wingless, obovoid, yellow-brown. 



Habitat. Altai mountains in central Siberia eastward to the Japan Sea, 

 Korea and Hokkaido. 



This species was one of the earliest known Rhododendrons and is the 

 only one within our region mentioned in the first edition of Linnaeus* 

 Species Plantarum. It was discovered by D. G. Messerschmidt sometime 

 between 1720 and 1727 and is well figured by Amman (Stirp. Rar. Icon. & 

 Des. 181, t. 27 (1739) under the name of " Chamaerhododendros folio 

 glabro, majusculo, amplo flore roseo." Gmelin (Fl. Sib. iv. 125 [1769]) 

 refers to it as "Andromeda foliis ovatis floribus patentibus, subsessilibus." 

 It was introduced into Petrograd by Pallas and, according to Aiton (Hort. 

 Kew. 66 [1789]), into England by Anthony Chamier, Esq., in 1780. With 

 its bright red-purple, flattish flowers R. dauricum is really a pretty 

 shrub and is one of the earliest to flower in the spring. It is a boreal 

 plant and probably thrives better in eastern North America than it does 

 in England but even here its expanded flowers are often destroyed by frost. 

 The leaves of the typical form are usually quite deciduous and in autumn 

 change to yellow and blackish bronze. The leaves on crushing or drying 

 are pleasantly fragrant. Quite often this shrub opens flowers freely in 

 late November as was the case last year when on November 20th in the 

 Arnold Arboretum one plant bore over fifty fully expanded flowers. 



Rhododendron dauricum var. sempervirens Sims in Bot. Mag. xliv. 



t. 1888 (February, 1817).— Loddiges in Bot. Cab. XVI. t. 1584 (1829). 

 DeCandolle, Prodr. vn. 725 (1839).— Mottet in Rev. Hort. 1908, 198, 

 fig. 78.— Bean, Trees & Shrubs Brit. Isl. n. 352 (1914).— Rehder in Bailey, 

 Stand. Cycl. Hort. v. 2939 (1916). 



Rhododendron dauricum /3. atrovirens Ker-Gawler in Bot. Reg. ill. t. 194 

 (May, 1817).— L. Spaeth in Gartenfl. liii. 267, figs. 39, 40 (1904). 



This variety is distinguished by its persistent leaves; the flowers are 

 dark red-purple and about the size of those of the type. It is a native of 

 the Altai region and is supposed to have been introduced into England 

 from Russia by Thomas Bell about 1798. It flowered in the nursery of 

 Messrs. Whitley, Brame & Milne at Parson's Green, in 1817 and was 

 named and figured by Sims. 



The typical form has leaves about 2.5 cm. long and 1.2 cm. broad but 



there is cultivated in the Edinburgh Botanic Gardens a plant with leaves 

 only half this size. 



Another evergreen variety the flowers of which have no stamens, is 



mentioned by Millais as R. dauricum var. emasculum (Rhodod. 152 [1917]). 



