216 



ARBORETUM ET FRUTICETUM BRITANNICUM. 



C. iabtirnum var. Iatif61ium Pers. and Du Mont ; Cytise des Alpes, 1'Aubours. Fr. ; Alpen Boh- 

 nenbaum, Gcr. ; Maggio Ciondolo, Ital. 



Engravings. Waldst. et Kit. Hung., 3. t. 260. ; the plate of this tree in Arb. Brit., 1st edit., vol. 

 and our fig. 342. 



342. Cytisus( Laburnum) alpinus. 



Spec. Char., $v. Branches glabrous and terete. Leaves petiolate ; leaflets 

 ovate-lanceolate, rounded at the base. Racemes pendulous. Pedicels and 

 calyxes puberulous. Legumes glabrous, few-seeded, marginate. (Don's 

 Mill.) A deciduous low tree. Found in Carinthia, in the Alps of Jura, 

 on Mount Cenis, and on the Apennines. According to some, it is also 

 found wild in Scotland ; but, though it is much cultivated in some parts of 

 Fifeshire and Forfarshire, it is far from being indigenous there. Height 

 20 ft. to 30 ft., sometimes much higher in a state of cultivation. It was 

 introduced into Britain about the same time as the other species, viz. 1596 ; 

 and was, probably, for a long time confounded with it; for which reason we 

 shall treat of the two species, or races, together. Flowers yellow j May 

 and June. Legume brown ; ripe in October. 



Varieties. 



5 s C. (L.) a. 2 pendulus has pendulous branches, and, in the foliage and 

 legumes, seems intermediate between C. Laburnum and C. (L.) al- 

 pinus. This is very obvious in a fine specimen of this variety in the 

 arboretum of the Messrs. Loddiges, as shown in the plate in Arb. 

 Brit., 1st edit., vol. v. The pendulous variety of C. .Laburnum is 

 a much less robust plant. 



t C. (L.) a. 3 purpurdscens Hort., C. L. purpiireum Hort., C. Adaim 

 Poir., C. L. coccineum Baum. Cat. y the purple Laburnum, the scarlet 

 Laburnum, is not a hybrid between C. Laburnum and C. purpureus, 

 as was at first supposed, but a sport from a bud of fytisus pur- 

 pureus inserted in C. alpinus, in 1825, by D. Adam, a nurseryman at 

 Vitry, near Paris. The flowers are of a reddish purple, slightly 

 tinged with buff, and are produced in pendent spikes, 8 in. or more 

 long. A few years after this sport was originated, it was found that 

 it had a strong tendency to return to the original kinds ; and that 

 from one bud or graft, branches were produced of the true Cytisus 

 purpureus, of the true .Laburnum (either the Alpine or the common. 



