156 THE BAMBOO GARDEN CHAP. 
they are 5 feet high, with a circumference of about 1 
inch. The wood is hard and tough, the cavity of the inter- 
node very small—not more than one-sixteenth of an inch. 
The colour is green at first, ripening to yellow. The nodes 
are not very prominent, the upper rim especially being more 
flattened than is usual. The branch-bearing side of the culm 
is flattened rather than grooved, as in the case of the other 
Phyllostachides. The internodes are long in proportion to 
the length of the culm; I have measured them up to 8 
inches in a 5-foot stem. The zigzagging, so characteristic 
of the group, is very strongly marked. The culm sheaths 
are purplish, soon withering as in other species. I can detect 
in them a few cross veinlets. The ligule is long and cut up, 
fringed with coarse hairs. The limbus narrow and bent back. 
The branches are borne in triplets, the longest, as I have 
already said, being in the middle. On an 8-inch internode 
the longest branch measures only about 9 inches. The 
leaves are of various sizes, the largest about 8 inches 
long by 14 inch wide. In shape they are lanceolate, 
pinched in near the top and ending in a fine point, 
attenuated at the base toa well-defined petiole. The tessella- 
tion is fine and regular. The secondary nerves on either side 
of the midrib from five to seven. The edges are serrated 
—very sharply on one side. The colour of the leaves is a 
bright and cheerful green above, glaucous on the lower 
face. 
In this country we have but a short acquaintance with 
this species, for I doubt whether a living plant was ever 
seen in England until it was introduced into Kew two years 
ago ; and, if Munro be right, there are considerable variations 
