944 



CORIARIA. 



SUPPLEMENT. 



COTYLEDON. 



with dark edges and tapering rapidly ; 

 towards the base they become deeply 

 channelled, with the edges rolled inwards 

 until they almost meet as a tube. The 

 plant seeds freely, the seed-vessels being 

 white at first and then blue. It grows 

 freely from seed, but the young plants 

 should be wintered under glass until three 

 or four years old. Botanically it is classed 

 as a form of C. Ba?iksu, but for garden 

 purposes it is quite distinct. North 

 Australia. 



CORI ABIA. — This group now contains 

 two or three new and handsome kinds of 

 greater value than the old plant mentioned 

 on page 510. The peculiarity of these 

 shrubs is in the formation of their berry- 

 like fruits. The flowers are small and 

 inconspicuous, with scale-like petals of 

 green, yellow, brown, or pink, and the 

 sexes mostly apart, though found upon the 

 same plant. After flowering, however, 

 the tiny petals thicken and swell into a 

 juicy fruit-like envelope surrounding the 

 seeds, and handsome when brilliantly 

 coloured as in the finer kinds. While 

 these fruits are of tempting appearance, 

 they are all more or less poisonous — a 

 fact to be borne in mind by planters. All 

 the kinds are of the easiest culture in 

 moist, loamy soils, the best kinds being 

 hardy (at least, at the root), and growing 

 again if cut down by frost. The follow- 

 ing are in cultivation : — 



C. japonica. — A handsome shrub with red- 

 brown woody stems 8 or 10 fr. high. The 

 leaves come in opposite pairs, arranged 

 regularly along either side of the stem, while 

 the tiny flowers of a pretty pink or coral-red, 

 appear early in June as racemes of i^ to 

 3 in. upon the stems of the previous year. 

 The fruits are round and bright red. 



C. nepalensis. — A stout rambling shrub of 

 nearly 20 ft., with woody stems bearing 

 three-nerved leaves and axillary clusters of 

 flowers and fruit, which distinguish it at once 

 from C. terniinalis, with which however it 

 was long confused. The flowers are brown, 

 appearing in May, and followed by black 

 fruits. In the south-west of England and 

 along the south coast, this plant succeeds in 

 the open, but inland it makes little progress. 

 In the variety maxiuia, the fruits are larger 

 and of a bluish colour. Himalaya, China, 

 and Japan. 



C. ruscifolia is a tall shrubby climber of 

 10 to 20 feet, with square stems and slender 

 arching shoots, covered with fresh green 

 foliage and sprays of tiny green flowers 

 drooping prettily from the leaf-axils. It is 

 hardy even into Scotland, where it dies down 

 like an herbaceous perennial. The flowers 

 come in slender racemes of 6 to 12 in., and 

 towards autumn the tiny green petals swell 

 into juicy fruits, of a rich purple colour in 



September and October, when this is one of 

 the most striking of wall or border plants. 

 New Zealand. 



C. terminalis.— A plant from the Thibetan 

 frontier of China, and quite hardy in the 

 south of Britain at least, making a shrubby 

 root-stock and herbaceous stems of 2 or 3 ft., 

 which die back each winter. The bark is 

 rough and warty, and the shoots thickly set 

 with pairs of rounded, dull green leaves. The 

 brown and yellow flowers appear in long 

 racemes from the tips of the shoots, diff"ering 

 in this from other kinds, in which they burst 

 from the leaf-axils. These inconspicuous 

 flowers give place to glossy, orange-yellow 

 fruits of great beauty, crowded upon long 

 tapering spikes of 6 to 9 in. These last 

 well upon the plant, but are worthless for 

 cutting. 



COROKIA. — Two pretty evergreen 

 shrubs from New Zealand, allied to the 

 Dogwoods, and hardy only in the warmer 

 parts of Britain. Plants more unlike are 

 seldom found so nearly related. Increase 

 by cuttings rooted in sand under a hand- 

 light, or by layers in the autumn. 



C. buddleoides is from the New 

 Zealand coast-belt, with glossy leaves 

 forming a handsome shrub 10 ft. high 

 and through, with lance-shaped dark 

 green leaves, silvery on the under side, 

 from a downy covering which extends to 

 the stems and branches. Starry yellow 

 flowers with an orange centre appear in 

 loose spike-like clusters during May and 

 June, followed by oval yellow berries. It 

 likes a half-shaded position in good loam, 

 growing fast and fruiting freely. 



C. cotoneaster. — Coming from the 

 mountains, this kind is hardier, and 

 easily grown in southern gardens. Though 

 really evergreen, the leaves are so small 

 and scattered that even in full growth the 

 plant has a peculiar appearance, and yet 

 so thickly do the stems interlace that 

 there is no suggestion of nakedness. The 

 tiny leaves are in the shape of a minia- 

 ture spoon rolled out under pressure, 

 bright green while young, becoming dark, 

 and finally orange red before falling. The 

 small starry yellow flowers are scattered 

 freely about the shoots, and should give 

 place to red or yellow berries, but these are 

 seldom seen in this country. The plant 

 grows well in a'north aspect and in partial 

 shade, but will also bear the sun in shel- 

 tered spots on the lawn or in the rock- 

 garden, where its tendency is to spread. 

 J. H. B. 



COTYLEDON. — As understood by 

 botanists, this now includes the groups 

 long known as EcJieveria and Umbilicus. 

 The first of these is still known so univer- 

 sally under the old name that we have no 



