264 CHINESE ECONOMIC TEEES 



Aralia chinensis Linnaeus. 



Chinese Angelica Tree. 



Shrub or tree to 8 m. tall, often with several stems and few, very 

 thick, prickly branches, spreading freely from root suckers. Leaves 

 often 1 m. long, decompound. Leaflets ovate, acuminate, coarsely serrate 

 or dentate, bright green above, pubescent or glabrescent or glaucous 

 below, short stalked, 6-15 cm. long. Flowers appear in late summer, 

 small, whitish, in numerous, globose umbels in a long panicle, 60 cm. 

 long; pedicels tomentose; styles distinct. Fruit small, black, numerous. 



China and Japan. 



This species shows much variability, particularly in the canescent or 

 glabrescent character of the leaflets, which has led some botanist to establish 

 a variety canescens and a variety glabrescens which, however, need not be 

 considered by the practical botanist. 



Aralia wilsonii Harms. 



A shrub 2-3 m. high resembling A. chinensis and apparently chiefly 

 differing in their glabrous or nearly glabrous inflorescence and foliage, 

 the under surface of the leaflets being bright green. The leaflets also 

 appear to have distinctly longer petiolules. May be a form of A. chinensis. 

 Found by E. H. Wilson in Western Szechuan. 



ACANTHOPANAX 



Trees or shrubs. Branches stout, usually with stout prickles. Leaves 

 deciduous, alternate, simple and palmately lobed, or digitately compound, 

 long petiolate. Flowers with valvate petals, small, greenish, perfect or 

 polygamous, in solitary umbels or in large terminal panicled umbels. 

 Calyx tube coherent with the ovary, minutely toothed; petals and stamens 

 5, inserted together on the edge of the disk. Ovary usually 5 celled, rarely 

 2. Styles 2-5, more or less connate at the base. Fruit black, a 2-5 

 seeded berry. 



About 18 species in Central and Eastern Asia from Manchuria to the 

 Himalayas. 



Propagated by root cuttings, by division, offsets, and by seeds. The 

 number of seeds per pound is about 55,000. They germinate very slowly. 



Acanthopanax ricinifolius Seeman. 



Tree 25 m. tall. Branchlets red-brown and with stout prickles. Leaves, 

 digitately 5-7 lobed, wider than long, subcordate or nearly truncate at the 



