THE BOTANISTS OF PHILADELPHIA. 255 



busy for years raising American oaks, maples, ashes, dog- 

 woods and scores of other plants. Cornus florida, one of the 

 finest of all hard}^ flowering trees, is raised by thousands. 

 Trees not often seen in nurseries, like the tupelo, sassa- 

 fras, persimmon and sycamore are here in numbers, as are 

 the magnolias and the tulip tree. But the nursery is not 

 only noted for the cultivation of American plants ; many 

 exotic species are cultivated on a large scale, and it is cer- 

 tainly true that the stock of young plants of the beautiful 

 Japanese Viburnum plicatam is larger than can be found 

 in all other American and European nurseries combined. 



The Germantown nurseries contain a number of re- 

 markable and interesting botanical specimens. Here is the 

 original of the well-known weeping dogwood, Cornus florida, 

 found in woods near Baltimore, and the original plant of 

 Haleda Meehani, a chance seedling raised by Mr. Meehan.* 

 There are here also a small specimen of a weeping variety 

 of Prunus sei^oiina and a fastigiate tree of Picea Engelmanni, 

 produced from a graft brought by Mr. Meehan from the 

 timber-line on Gray's Peak in Colorado. 



One of the best plants in the United States or Europe 

 of the Japanese and northern China, Qaercus dentata, can be 

 seen in this garden, thirty feet high, with a stout, v/ell-formed 

 trunk and spreading branches. The hardiness of this hand- 

 some tree in the neighborhood of Philadelphia appears to 

 be demonstrated. Here, too, is a fine specimen of Cedrela 

 Sineasis, nearly thirty feet high. Near the cedrela flour- 

 ishes one of the best specimens of Hovenia dulcis, which can 

 be seen outside of Japan. There grows a large specimen, 



* Garden and Forest, V : 535, figure. 



