138 ON SOME MOUNTAIN PLANTS FROM NORTHERN CHINA. 



own Lapland specimen in my herbarium (Fl. Lapp., n. 193) is 

 male. 



Salicis sp. A $ specimen, with quite young fruit and leaves, 

 the former canescently silky, and the latter silky also beneath, oval 

 and quite entire. Though I have taken much trouble with it I 

 cannot be sure of its affinity, but unless I err, it belongs typically, 

 though both style and fruit-stalk are very short, to the same group as 

 the last, and is somewhat related to S. sachalinensis, Fr. Schmidt, S. 

 arhuscula, Linn., &c., and perhaps also to S. udensis, Trautv., and 

 S. sclerophylla, Anders., which I have not seen. The leaves are not 

 unlike Andersson's figure of the latter. — fMonogr. Salicum, t. viii., 

 f. 82.) 



Pinus {Larix) davurica^ Fisch. (Trautv. Imag., pi. ross., t. xxxii. 

 optima!) '* J'en ai vu de vastes arbres. Les Chinois, qui appellent 

 cet arbre Lo-ye-sung (Pin dont les feuilles tombent), m'ont raconte 

 qu'il est assez commun sur les hautes montagnes du pays. II est bien 

 remarquable qu'a I'exception de ce Larix, on ne rencontre pas de 

 coniferes du tout sur cette montagne.'* Excellently dried specimens, 

 with foliage, <^ flowers and ripe cones, agreeing perfectly with 

 authentic ones from the Upper Ussuri. Endlioher distinguished this 

 from its very near ally P. Ledebourii, Endl. !, by its nodding, not 

 ascending cones ; but I do not find this character hold good in the 

 latter species. Trautvetter and Meyer (Florul. Ochot., phaenog. 88 ) 

 discriminate the two by the form of the cone-scales ; but according to 

 Ruprecht (Bullet. Acad. St. Petersb. xv., 4S6), this character is also 

 subject to variation. P. leptolepis, Endl. ! interposed between the 

 two by both Endlicher and Paiiatore, is well characterised by 

 its larger cones, with strongly refiexed scales. Parlatore makes P. 

 Zedebourii a. tall treelike our Larch, P. davunca, a low shrub never 

 exceeding ten feet ; but this is because he relied exclusively on 

 descriptions applying to local specimens only of the latter. Ruprecht 

 describes it (loco supra citato), from Maximowicz's notes, as attaining 

 60 feet on the Amur. In a recent revision of the Larches (Acta hort 

 Petrop i., 156) Dr. Eegel reduces P. Ledehourii to P. Larix, Linn., 

 but retains P. davurica as a species. Loudon (Arbor, et Frutic. 

 liritann. iv., 2352) referred both as varieties to the common Larch 

 Though I believe this is the first precise indication published by a 

 botanist, from actual verification of specimens, of the existence of a 

 Larch in China Proper, there is distinct evidence that the tree grows 

 at least 10° south of Peking. The Abbe Bavid writes (Journ. N. 

 China Br. R. As. Soc, n.s., vii., 213.) — '* Notre Larix, que j'ai 

 retrouve jusqu'au Kiang-si, mais point au Setchuan et a Moupin, 

 rae parait difterer pen ou point du L. europcea,^'' And the Rev. G. 

 E. Moule, of the Church of England Missionary Society, who resides 

 at Hang-chau — the Kinsay of Marco Polo—^the capital of the province 

 of Che-kiang, thus replied last year to some inquiries of mine : 

 ''What I have called Larch — simply because it is a deciduous 

 Conifer — is the Chinese Kin-sung or King'ts-ien-sung* (Gold Pine, or 



* This is the book name (translated by Endlicher *' Pinus nummularia "). as 

 well as a vernacular equivalent, given in Japan to P. leptolepis, Endl. (HoflF- 

 mann and Schultes, "Noms indigenes d'uiv ohoix de pi. du Japon et de la 

 Chine," p. 13.) 



