IDESIA. 507 



7 feet high has bloomed regularly for more than thirty years 

 without even the protection of a wall. It stands in the centre of 

 the garden facing the south, exposed to the east and west, but 

 sheltered from the north by a hill. It grows so rapidly that but 

 for its being pruned every year it would cast too heavy a shade in 

 summer, when it is thickly covered with large handsome leaves, 

 and recently the tree reached such a size, that a large bough had 

 to be sawn off to admit light to the other plants in its vicinity." 

 As grown in a conservatory, a writer in the Botanical Magazine 

 says : — " the beauty of the Calycanthus surpasses all description. 

 The plant is 16 feet high and expands 10 feet wide. It is covered 

 with blossoms from top to bottom and the fragrance of it may l)e 

 perceived at a distance of fifty yards from the conservatory. The 

 tree bears a succession of flowers from September to March." 



The Chimonanthus thrives in almost any kind of soil and is 

 easily propagated by seeds or layers. Young cuttings will also 

 strike root if planted in a pot of sand with a bell-glass placed over 

 them, in a little bottom heat ; but this method is not so successful 

 as layering. 



Idesia. 



Idesia jjolycarpa forms a genus of Bixinece {Flacourtiacecr), allied 

 to Bennetia. It is also known in gardens as Pobjcarpa Maximo- 

 iviczii, and is a large growing Japanese tree, which was unknown to 

 Science until 1866, when it was described by the Piussian botanist, 

 Maximowicz, who met with it in cultivation at Xipon and Yedo, 

 and ascertained that it was a native of the island of Kiusiu, at the 

 foot of a mountain called Hikosan. He named it in commemoration 

 of a Dutch traveller named Ides. The large, alternate leaves 

 have Ions crimson stalks, and are acuminate, slic^htlv cordate at 

 the base, irregularly serrate, the larger ones measuring about 6 

 inches across, bright green above, and whitish or almost glaucous 

 beneath, with 5 prominent branching nerves, which are reddish 

 towards the base. The flowers are in long, terminal panicles, and 

 spring from the axils of the upper leaves. They are dioecious 

 and apetalous. The male flowers have from 4 to 6 yellowish-green, 

 spreading sepals, an indefinite number of stamens inserted on a small 

 disc and having villose filaments (pale green in colour) and short 

 longitudinally dehiscent, orange-coloured anthers. Each blossom is 



