THE RHODODENDRON. 



at great altitudes. Here it grows to 

 perfection. Does it not seem too bad 

 that this elegant mountain beauty, with 

 its magnificent flowers of rose or purple, 

 should be doomed to waste its sweet- 

 ness on the desert air. On Mount 

 Tonglo, in Nepal, at 7,000 ft. altitude, 

 [)r. Hooker discovered a very interest- 

 ing variety ; it was an epiphyte living 



The Doctor named this variety Dal- 

 housii, in honor of the wife of the then 

 Governor General of India, Lady 

 Dalhousie. 



In America there are about six varie- 

 ties, found mostly in the middle states. 

 One variety, R. maximum, one of the 

 finest, is found from New England to 

 (leorgia. 



Fig. 1027. —Rhododendron D.\lhod.sii. 



high up on the trunks of oak or Magno 

 lis trees, with a stalk often five or six 

 feet in length. It was from the numer- 

 ous lily like flowers of the Rhododen 

 dron, and the egg like flowers of a 

 peculiar Magnolia tree strewing the 

 ground, that Dr. Hooker was led to the 

 discovery. He says, "So conspicuous 

 were the flowers that my rude guides 

 called out, " Here are lilies and eggs, 

 sir, growing out of the ground," a very 

 fair description. 



The name rhododendron, is from the 

 (Ireek words rhodos a rose, and den- 

 dron a tree, in allusion to its rose red 

 flowers, and it is botanically allied to 

 the A/.ilea. The shrub is evergreen, 

 most varieties growing to from one to 

 ten feet high, and about the same 

 breadth, and the flowers, which grow in 

 terminal clusters, vary in color from 

 white to pink, yellow, lilac, crimson and 

 deep purple. 



