VITIS 677 



Native of Chile and S. Brazil; introduced about 1878. Against a wall 

 this survives all but the hardest winters, but is tender in the open. It is a 

 very elegant plant, luxuriantly leafy, and with beautifully cut leaves. 

 Tweedie, the Kew collector in S. America, called it the " ivy of Uruguay," 

 and says it covers the bushes with red berries in winter. It thrives very 

 well in the south and west, and bore large crops of fruit at St Leonard's as 

 long ago as 1885, but the berries were purplish rather than red. When cut 

 down to the ground by frost it will often break up again the following summer, 

 but on the whole it it is only well adapted for the mildest counties. 



V. THUNBERGII, Siebold. FIG-LEAVED VINE. 



(Bot. Mag., t. 8558; V. Sieboldii, Hart.} 



A slender-stemmed, only moderately vigorous, deciduous climber, the 

 young shoots angled, more or less woolly. Leaves variable, but deeply 

 three- or five-lobed, usually i\ to 4, sometimes 6 ins. across, heart- 

 shaped at the base. Lobes ovate, often penetrating half or more than half 

 the depth of the blade, the space (or sinus) between the lobes often expanding 

 and rounded at the bottom; sharply, shallowly, and irregularly toothed, dark 

 dull green and smooth above, covered with a rusty brown felt beneath. 

 Leaf-stalk about half the length of the blade. Berries in bunches 2 or 3 ins. 

 long, black with a purple bloom, f in. or less in diameter. 



Native of Japan ; introduced probably by Siebold. The name has gen- 

 erally in this country been wrongly applied to a fine form of V. Coignetias 

 (q.v.}, from which it is quite distinct in its comparatively small leaves, deeply 

 lobed like those of a fig, and its slender, less woody, five-angled young shoots. 

 It is much nearer V. FICIFOLIA, Bunge; in fact the distinctions between 

 these two are not very clear. It has also been associated with V. Labrusca, 

 but that species must be regarded as purely N. American, and as more 

 nearly allied to V. Coignetias than V. Thunbergii, both of which, however, 

 are distinguished from it by having a tendril missing from every third joint 

 of the young shoot. V. Thunbergii is grown at Kew and at Bitton, where it 

 turns rich crimson in autumn, and occasionally bears fruit. In my experience 

 it is a rather weak grower, the ends of the shoots dying back considerably 

 every winter. 



V. THOMSONII, (f}Lawson. 



A slender, deciduous climber of the quinquefolia group ; young stems 

 slightly downy at first, ribbed. Leaves composed normally of five leaflets, 

 borne on a slender downy stalk, i^ to 4^ ins. long. Leaflets oval or obovate, 

 i to 4 ins. long, \ to i^ ins. wide; slenderly pointed, the upper half shallowly 

 but sharply toothed, the base entire and tapered to a stalk, \ to f in. long; 

 under-surface sparsely downy on the midrib, glossy. The entire leaf, leaf- 

 stalk, and young shoots are of bright claret purple when young, becoming 

 greenish purple later, changing finally to deep reddish purple. Flowers in 

 cymes on a slender stalk. 



Native of China; introduced by Wilson for Messrs Veitch in 1900. It 

 was awarded a first-class certificate by the Royal Hort. Society, Sept. i, 1903, 

 and is, indeed, one of the most charming acquisitions of recent years amongst 

 hardy climbers. It seems- to |me, however, very doubtful that this is the 

 V. Thomsonii described' by M. A. Lawson in the first volume of Hooker's 

 Flora of British India, p. 657, although that view is adopted by Gagnepain in 

 Plantce Wilsoniance, vol. i., p. 101. It appears to be more nearly related to 

 y. Henryana, but is decidedly hardier. I have never seen it suffer from 

 frost. 



