24 THE AZALEAS OF THE OLD WORLD 



C. Maximowicz (Herb. Kew and Herb. Gray, co-type of R. indicum 

 y. macranthum subvar. a. genuinum Maximowicz) ; prov. Suruga, foot of 

 Mt. Fuji, cultivated, June 13, 1914, E. H. Wilson (No. 6932); prov. 

 Musashi, Yokohama, cultivated, 1862, C. Maximowicz (Herb. Kew and 

 Herb. Gray); Tokvo. cultivated. July 2, 1882, K. Miyabe', same locality 

 (Herb. Bot. Gard. Tokyo, type of R. lateritium var. brachytrichum 

 Nakai); prov. Shimotsuke, Nikko., alt. 600-1000 m. cultivated and 

 sub-spontaneous, June 20 flowers, October 20 fruit, 1914, E. H. Wilson 

 (Nos. 6816, 6818, 7709). 



Cultivated: Java ex Herb. Ludg.-Bat. 1863, as R. indicum Sweet 

 (Herb. Kew); Hongkong Bot. Gard. May 12, 14, 31, 1919, W. J. 

 Tutcher. 



The only place where I have seen this species truly wild is Yaku-shima, an island 

 some ninety miles south of Kagoshima and interesting as being the southern limit 

 of the range of a great many Japanese plants. On that island R. indicum Sweet is a 

 common fluviatile shrub growing from a half to two meters high and forming dense 

 masses in open country on the banks of rock-strewn streams. Elsewhere in Japan 

 I found it cultivated only, although in old burial and temple grounds it is often 

 more or less naturalized. Makino says it grows spontaneously in the provinces of 

 Kii and Yamato in Hondo and not so very far from the old capital of Kyoto. In 

 an old burial ground at Nikko the plants were prostrate or nearly so and with 

 their scattered, large red flowers strongly suggested the Rock Cistus, and one saw 

 how very applicable was the name the ancients gave this plant. The plants though 

 often decumbent are naturally upright and very densely branched; the branches 

 are slender but rigid and are clothed with flattened, appressed, strigose, chestnut- 

 brown hairs which in the second and third years lose their color and disappear. 

 The leaves are sub-coriaceous and crowded, short-petioled, narrow-lanceolate, 

 lanceolate to oblanceolate, mucronulate, dark green, rather shining above, pallid 

 or sub-glaucous beneath, ciliolate, usually remotely crenate-dentate, with scat- 

 tered, closely appressed, red-brown setose hairs on both surfaces; in the autumn 

 the leaves change to crimson and vinous purple. The flowers are terminal, solitary 

 or in pairs; the corolla is broad-funnel shape, opening at the same time or im- 

 mediately before annual growth commences, bright red to scarlet, sometimes rose- 

 red; there are 5 stamens shorter than the style but equalling or exceeding the 

 corolla in length. 



In Japanese gardens this Azalea is a prime favorite and I was told that some- 

 thing like two hundred named forms are recognized. It is planted on or among 

 rocks, singly or in groups, and is used as a garden edging. It bears trimming well, and 

 its naturally low, dense habit makes it particularly useful in the gardens of Japan. 

 Its native name is "Satsuki-tsutsuji," that is Fifth-month Azalea, from the fact 

 that it blossoms in June, which is the fifth month of the year reckoning by the old 

 Chinese calendar. 



The first mention of this plant in a European book is in Breyne's Prodromus, I. 

 23 (1680), which I have not seen, but in the edition of 1739 it is mentioned in pt. 

 1. 16 as " Chamaerhododendron exoticum, amplissimis floribus liliaceis." Breyne 

 was a merchant of Danzig and a distinguished botanist who visited Holland dur- 

 ing the last quarter of the 17th century and in his Prodomus described the re- 

 markable plants he saw there. His "Chamaerhododendron " was growing in the 

 garden of a Mr. Beveringk, but no mention is made of its country of origin. 



