150 Ornamental Shrubs. 



DIERVILLA Weigela. 



ALTHOUGH this group is classified by the bota- 

 nists as Diervilla, the plants are so much better 

 known as weigelas that the continued use of the 

 name under which they were introduced to English horti- 

 culturists is still maintained in most of the catalogues, and 

 is perhaps still to be preferred for common use. That 

 name was given by Thunberg in honor of Weigel, a Ger- 

 man scientist enjoying at the time considerable distinction 

 as a botanist. But as a French surgeon, Dr. Dierville, 

 had previously reported the discovery of an American 

 member of the family, which, by the by, proves to be the 

 only one indigenous to this country, the genus had been 

 named in honor of this discoverer before the introduction 

 of the Asiatic species to European gardens, and under the 

 well-known law of priority, the name still adheres. The 

 Chinese plant was discovered by Robert Fortune in 1844, 

 and was esteemed by him one of the most beautiful of all 

 the plants which he had been able to gather and send 

 to European gardens from that floriferous country. The 

 first specimen which he saw is described as growing in a 

 Mandarin's garden on the island of Chusan, and character- 

 ized as a bush covered with rose-colored flowers, which 

 hung in graceful bunches from the axils of the leaves and 

 the ends of the branches. " Everyone saw and admired 

 the beautiful weigela. I immediately marked it as one 

 of the finest plants in northern China and determined to 

 send plants of it home in every ship until I should hear of 

 its safe arrival. It forms a neat bush, not unlike a syringa 

 in habit, deciduous in winter and flowering in the months 



