20 F QUEST FLORA OF JAPAN. 



peduncle-bract is rounded at the apex, sessile or short-stalked, three or four inches long, from 

 one third to two thirds of an inch broad, and, like the slender stems and branches of the 

 flower-cluster and its bractlets, covered with pale tomentum. The flowers appear in Sapporo 

 toward the middle of July. Like those of the American Lindens and of two species of eastern 

 Europe, Tilia petiolaris and Tilia argentea, which Tilia Miqueliana resembles in several partic- 

 ulars, the flowers are furnished with petal-like scales, to which the stamens, united in clusters, 

 are attached. The sepals are ovate-acute, tomentose on the two surfaces, especially on the 

 inner, and shorter than the narrow obovate petals. The style, like the stamens, is longer 

 than the petals, and is coated at the base with thick pale hairs, which also cover the ovary. 

 The fruit, which ripens in October, is ovate to oblong, wingless, and nearly half an inch long. 

 It is from the inner bark of this species that the Ainos make their ropes. 



Tilia Miqueliana ' is comparatively little known, having at one time been confounded with 

 Tilia Mandshurica, Avhich does not reach Japan. This noble tree Avill probably thrive in the 

 northern states, as plants which have been growing for a few years in the Arnold Arboretum 

 appear perfectly hardy. In Europe it is cultivated as Tilia Mandshurica (Kew), and as Tilia 

 heteropliylla (Paris), although it does not appear to be much better known there than it is in 

 the United States. 



The second Japanese Linden is a small tree, rarely growing more than fifty or sixty feet 

 tall in Hokkaido, where, perhaps, it is rather less abundant than Tilia Miqueliana. In books 

 it appears as Tilia cordata, var. Japonica ; but Tilia cordata is a synonym for Tilia ulmifolia, 

 a common European and north Asian species, so that unless the Japanese plant is found 

 specifically distinct, which is not probable, it should be known as Tilia ulmifolia, var. Japonica. 

 It is a round-headed tree with dark brown bark, slender red-brown branches, glabrous, like 

 the buds, even when young, and marked with oblong pale lenticels. The leaves are broadly 

 ovate or nearly orbicular, contracted at the apex into short or long broad points, and usually 

 cordate, or occasionally oblique, at the base, and sharply serrate with incurved callous teeth ; 

 they are membranaceous, light green and lustrous on the upper surface, light green, pale, or 

 nearly white on the lower surface, which is marked by conspicuous tufts of rufous hairs in the 

 axils of the principal veins, three or four inches long, and two or three inches broad. The 

 peduncle-bract is from three to three and a half inches long, and half an inch broad, with a 

 slender stalk sometimes an inch in length. The stem and branches of the flower-cluster are 

 slender and glabrous. The sepals, which are acute, slightly puberulous on the outer surface, 

 ciliate on the margins, and furnished on the inner surface at the base with large tufts of pale 

 hairs, are shorter than the narrow acute petals ; the ovary is clothed with white tomentum. 

 The fruit is oblong, or slightly obovate, and covered with rusty tomentum. The petaloid- 

 scales, which Maximowicz 2 found developed in some of the flowers of this tree, I have not 

 seen. 



This is the only Linden cultivated by the Japanese, who occasionally plant it in temple 

 gardens, especially in the interior and mountainous part of the empire. It was introduced in 



1 Tilia Miqueliana, Maximowicz, Mel. Biol. x. 585. 



Tilia Mandshurica, Miquel, Prol. Fl. Jap. 206 (in part). Franchet & Savatier, Enum. PI. Jap. i. 67 (in part). 



2 Mel. Biol. x. 585. 



