134 ON SOME MOUNTAIN PLANTS FEOM NORTHERN CHINA. 



au pied du Po-hua-shan. Ilfaut remarquer que les folioles des feuilles 

 eloignees des branches florifbres sont jusqu'k trois fois plus grandes 

 que celles que vous voyez dans mes specimens." The reduction of 

 this to the European Manna Ash is due to the acuteness of Mr. D, 

 Hanbury (cfr. Journ. Bot., xi., 171), and a number of samaras 

 kindly given me by him from Sicilian specimens seem to leave no 

 doubt that he is right. I suppose the Nipalese F. florihunda, Wall., 

 is equally unstable. I have for the present thought it well to distin- 

 guish the Chinese tree as a variety, on account of its greater height 

 and the extraordinary size of the 1-2 jugate leaflets. The specimen 

 sent is in very young fruit.* 



Fraxinus {Fraxinaster) rhyncliophylla, Hance. 



Periploca sepium, Bge. " Plante tres-commune dans les mon- 

 tagnes. Fleurs violettes. En chinois yang^ter-ye. Les chinois man- 

 gent les feuilles. Toutes les parties de cette plante sont remplies d'un 

 sue laiteux." 



Gentiana ( Chondrophylla) squarrosa, Led. 



Eritriohium [Endogoyiia) pedimculare, A. DC. 



Rheum Rhaponticum, Linn. ? '* Feuille d'une plante que les 

 Ghinois disent etre une esp^ce de rhubarbe. J'envoie aussila racine." 

 I have besides a very fair flowering specimen of this, from Father 

 David, gathered on the higher mountains in the neighbourhood of 

 Peking.f Sections of the woody rhizome have a not unpleasant 

 scent, very unlike medicinal rhubarb, and impart a deep yellow 

 colour to alcohol. I cannot make out from the dried specimens that 

 the petiole is sulcate beneath, but the plant agrees very well with 

 Hayne's figure (Arzneigewachse fasc. 12, t. vii), though that is cited 

 with a query by Meissner. 



Euphorlia {Tithjmalus, Esulce) Esula, Linn., s cyparisstoideSy 

 Boiss. 



Hemiptelea JDavidii, Planch. ** Tres-commun dans les montagnes. 

 Arbies de 30 a 40 pieds. Mais generalement on ne voit que des 

 arbrisseaux qui forment des haies impenetrables." The specimen is 

 sterile, and the stout spines (abortive branches) are in pairs, each 

 pair springing at intervals of two inches or so from opposite sides of the 

 old branch. One of these spines is only about an inch long, the other as 

 much as four inches, with occasionally a smaller spine or two spring- 

 ing from it at right angles near the extremity : both point in the same 

 direction. By the side of or beneath these stout spines the slender 

 leafy shoots arise. 



Morus alha^ Linn., 75 mongolica, Bur. I think M. Bureau's sugges- 

 tion that this very singular plant may be the original wild type of the 

 T0rhite mulberry extremely probable ; for, whereas here in the south 



* Since this paper was written I have received a letter from Dr. Bretr 

 Schneider, in which I find the following interesting remark:— "Je ne saispas si je 

 vous ai ecrit que j'ai vu dans un des jardins imperiaux aux environs de Pekin ui^ 

 grand arhre de Fraxinus Bungcatia que les Chinois appellent la shu (arbre a cire). 

 lis m'ont rapports qu'en hiver cet arbre so couvre de cire blanche." 



t " Les montagnes de Pekin et la Mongolie nourrissent une espece de Rheum 

 a feuilles enti^res, aiix racines de laquelle les Russes paraissent donner la pre- 

 ference." — (David in Journ, N. -China, Br. R. As. 80c., n.s. no. vii., 215.) 



