109 
XVI. 
GARDEN NOTES ON NEW OR RARE TREES 
AND SHRUBS: XxX. 
W. J. Bran. 
Aucuba chinensis, Bentham. [Cornaceae.] 
For many years the only Aucubas in cultivation were the 
common A. japonica and its numerous forms, but during his 
earlier journeys in China on behalf of Messrs. Veitch, Mr. E. H. 
Wilson introduced this species to the Coombe Wood Nursery, 
whence it was obtained for Kew. Bentham first described it 
as long ago as 1861 in his “‘ Flora Hongkongensis,” p. 138. It 
is an evergreen shrub found up to 9 feet high in a wild state, 
with glabrous young shoots and leaves. The leaves appear to 
be very variable in shape; on the Kew plants they are oblong, 
acute, rounded to cuneate at the base, coarsely and irregularly 
dentate, of a greyer green and duller in hue than any of the 
forms of A. japonica, also thicker and stiffer in texture. 
Mr. Rehder in “‘ Plantae Wilsonianae,’”’ Vol. ii. p. 572, describes 
two forms :—var. obcordata with obovate leaves tapering from 
a truncate apex to the cuneate base; and var. angustifolia with 
narrow, linear-lanceolate leaves up to 8 in. long and } to 1} in. 
wide. The flowers of A. chinensis differ from those of A. japonica 
in the petals being longer and slenderly acuminate. The fruit 
is red, ovoid, about } in. long, produced in short globose panicles. 
is shrub is a native of Western China, in the provinces of 
Hupeh, Yunnan and Szechuen, also of Hong Kong and Formosa. 
The Western Chinese forms have smaller leaves, fruits and panicles 
and are probably the hardier. But Wilson’s plant is not hardy 
at Kew and it was much injured by the frosts of December, 1920. 
It will no doubt be hardy in the south-western counties and of 
value there for planting in deep shade. There is no large-leaved 
evergreen shrub so useful as A. japonica for providing an under- 
growth up to 6 feet high beneath trees casting a dense shade. 
Berberis Vernae, Schneider; syn. B. Caroli var. hoanghensis, 
Schneider. [Berberidaceae. | ; 
This species was originally described by Schneider from 
specimens collected by the late W. Purdom in Western Kansu, 
China, but it was introduced to cultivation by E. H. Wilson, 
who found it in the Upper Min Valley, Western Szechuen, in 
1910. It is his No. 4022, the seeds of which were distributed 
under the synonym given above. Mr. Schneider subsequently 
came to the conclusion that B. Caroli var. hoanghensis and B. 
Vernae were the same. 
It is a deciduous shrub 6 to 10 ft. high, with glabrous, grooved 
young shoots, armed at the lower part with stiff three-pronged 
spines, } to 14 in. long, reduced at the terminal flowering part 
of the shoot to a single, much smaller, needle-like spine. Leaves 
in fascicles of as many as eight, spathulate or oblanceolate, often 
quite entire, but occasionally with a few small slender teeth; 
