Shrubs and Vines 



individualism that are as refreshing as a cool breeze on 

 a sultry day. 



Is there any flower of the woods that the explorer is 

 more glad to discover than the delicate but showy azalea? 

 This is a small brother, as it were, of the rhododendron ; 

 of less massive type, but far better adapted to the lim- 

 itations of garden or conservatory. While the type of 

 flower and leaf is closely modelled after that of the 

 rhododendron, the latter has evergreen foliage, whereas 

 the azalea is deciduous. 



To begin with our American species, the least preten- 

 tious is the small-flowered clammy azalea, which is 

 superior, nevertheless, to many other sorts in its ex- 

 treme fragrance ; yet it is hardly one to be chosen for 

 cultivation. The purple azalea — a misleading name, as 

 it has a variety of colors — also called pinxter-flower, is 

 the most widely distributed, and among the most wel- 

 come of May flowers, its profuse bloom burying the 

 shrub in rich tints. Of more surprising brilliance, 

 however, is the flame-colored azalea, indigenous in our 

 territory only in the southern portion, blossoming rather 

 late in summer, and one of the comparatively few con- 

 tributions of the New World to Europe, which has 

 adopted it among its choice shrubs. 



But in this as in many other genera, the Old World 

 leads the New, which is not surprising, if in the origin 

 of species the radiating centre was in Asia, the source of 

 many so-called European species ; and it may be to this 

 fact as well as to peculiarly favorable soil and climate 

 that the region of Japan and China is so pre-eminent in 

 the choicest forms and colors of vegetation. From the 



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