HORTUS VEITCHII 



In 1855 Thomas Lobb sent a species with small cerise-crimson flowers from 

 Sumatra, subsequently found to be the species Rhododendron *malayanum of 

 Jack, figured in the Botanical Magazine with the following remarks : " Dr. 

 William Jack, of the late East India Company's Service, a very able botanist 

 and author of ' Malayan Miscellanies,' was the first to make known this fine 

 plant (in about 1823) which he discovered on the summit of Gunong Bunko, a 

 remarkably insulated mountain, commonly called by the Europeans the Sugar- 

 loaf, in the interior of Bencoolen, Sumatra. Dr. Jack observed of this mountain 

 that, though estimated at only 3000 ft. in height, the character of its vegetation 

 is decidedly alpine, which he attributed to the form and consequent exposure of 

 the sharp conical peak. R. malayanum has since been gathered repeatedly on 

 Mount Ophir, Malacca, at an altitude of 4000 ft., and is clearly the same plant as 

 the Javanese R. tubiflorum. 



" The Celebes Island R. celebicum differs only in the paler under surface of its 

 leaves, and was originally introduced by Lobb in 1854, probably from Borneo 

 where he was travelling : as that indefatigable collector had already visited Mount 

 Ophir, whence he had sent excellent dried specimens, now in the Hookerian 

 Herbarium, it is probable that the Bornean habitat is a mistake." 



The plant is said to form a shrub or small tree with elliptic or elliptic-lanceolate 

 leaves 3 to 4 in. long; the flowers, in terminal few-flowered umbels, are f in. 

 long by about ^ in. across at the mouth, dull-scarlet or cerise-crimson in 

 colour. 



Curtis followed Thomas Lobb as collector in the East, and sent home many 

 plants, amongst them being two new species of Rhododendron, named respectively 

 R. t Teysmanni and R. J multicolor. 



Rhododendron Teysmanni, a lax shrub, is a native of Penang and Sumatra, 

 with golden-yellow flowers 2i in. in diameter. Exhibited for the first time in 

 flower in March 1885, a certificate was awarded. 



Though not in itself a first-class garden plant, the flowers reflexed and the 

 trusses small, R. Teysmanni has for cross-breeding proved one of the best, and 

 entered largely into the present race of hybrids. 



Rhododendron multicolor is distinct from the Malayan species in the form of 

 its funnel-shaped corolla, and approaching R. citrinum, differs from that species 

 in the absence of calyx-lobes, and in the possession of twice as many stamens. 

 The most marked characteristic of the species is the great variability in the 

 colour of the flowers, in the type yellow, and in the variety Curtisii, rich 

 crimson. 



This last-mentioned received a First Class Certificate at the meeting of the 

 Royal Horticultural Society on November 13th, 1883, when it was greatly 

 admired. 



HYBRIDS. 



From the fore-mentioned seven species of Rhododendron, all of which are 

 natives of the various islands of the Malay archipelago, there have been produced, 

 by hybridizing and cross-breeding in a variety of ways, several hundred new 



* Bot. Mag. t. 6045. f Bot. Mag. t. 6850, as K. javanicum, var. tubiflora. 



% Bot. Mag. t. 6769. PI. and Pom. 1884, p. 113. 



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