AGRICULTURAL INDUSTRIES. 159 



in landscape gardening, for the sake of their fine large pinnate 

 leaves, which in good soil often grow to be more than a meter long, 

 and far exceed all other species of Rhus in size and beauty. These 

 leaves are unequally pinnate, and have long stems. Before falling 

 off in October they become yellow or brownish red. Fresh leaves 

 appear in May. There are from nine to fifteen leaflets, large, 

 oval, pointed and unindented, and have fine short hairs on the 

 under side. 



In June appear loose, greenish yellow branches of blossoms, 

 growing from numerous axils near the end of the thick twigs. 

 The fruit is ripe in the second half of October — dry, yellowish 

 green stone-fruit, which remain hanging all winter, though usually 

 gathered in November. 



In the case of the lacquer-tree, the two sexes are separate. 

 Therefore when the chief object of its cultivation is the manufacture 

 of fat from its seeds, male trees should be avoided, reproduction 

 being obtained, not by seed, but by root-sprouts from female 

 specimens. On the other hand, if the object is to get lacquer, 

 propagation is brought about with seeds, because they furnish 

 hardier, better-rooted trees. 



Lacquer-trees bear fruit from the eighth year onwards. When 

 eighteen or twenty years old, they are at their best for yielding 

 lacquer, furnishing at that age the greatest quantity'; and then 

 they are sacrificed and replaced by others. On the other hand, 

 lacquer-trees that are looked to only or chiefly for seeds and 

 wax, as in Aidzu and South-eastern Echigo, reach a great age, 

 increasing in productiveness up to their thirtieth, or even fortieth 

 year. 



The lacquer-tree flourishes, it is true, all over Japan, from the 

 Riukiu Islands to Yezo. But in southern sections of the country 

 it is only occasionally found cultivated, and nowhere extensively, 

 despite the fact that its near relative, the tallow-tree, occurs there. 

 The principal region of its cultivation is, however. Northern Hondo, 

 between latitudes 37° and 39°. Large plantations are especially 

 met with in the valley of the Tadami-gawa with the central 

 Hibara in Western Aidzu, and also at Yonegawa and Mogami in 

 Uzen, as well as in Northern Echigo. Many a village here lies, as 

 it were, in a grove of lacquer-trees. Along the borders of valley- 

 bottoms and in mountain-hollows, where rice and sometimes even 

 other crops cannot be raised, lacquer-plantations are very often 

 seen ; less frequently, trees planted in rows and at regular intervals 

 in cultivated fields, are found, like fruit-trees with us. But in no 

 case are they manured like ordinary plants, for it is understood 

 that their roots draw enough nourishment from the fields of them- 

 selves. As a rule, old and young trees grow promiscuously to- 

 gether — at least wherever reproduction is obtained through root- 

 sprouts. 



In South-western Aidzu the lacquer-tree is the chief of all the 



