CHAP. V. ORNAMENTAL TREES, SHRUBS, ETC. 565 



Propagated by layers, which usually take a long time before 

 rooting. Mr. Mackintosh says that it should be grafted on 

 Corobretum Pinceanum, or some other free-growing species. 



2. P. Roxburgh!!. A powerful rambling shrub, overgrowing 

 a great extent of space ; bears in January brush-like trusses of 

 dingy-white flowers of no attractiveness. 



Combretum. 



Several species of this genus of noble scandent shrubs are 

 now found commonly enough . in the gardens about Calcutta ; 

 all those, however, of an ornamental kind are seemingly of 

 recent introduction. They are apt to become rampant, and 

 are benefited by being well cut in when the time of flowering is 

 over, and bloom the better for it afterwards. They are propa- 

 gated by layers, which are sometimes slow in rooting. Cuttings 

 here do not succeed, and some difficulty in striking them ap- 

 pears to be met with in England likewise, for a writer in the 

 * Gardener's Chronicle ' observes : " This arises from not 

 selecting fit pieces for cuttings, for short-jointed firm bits of 

 young wood, treated in the ordinary manner, root freely. These 

 are easily obtained from pot-bound specimens." Some bear 

 seed abundantly, from which plants may be readily raised, but 

 these will take four or five years at least before coming into 

 bloom. 



Mr. Mackintosh says : " As soon as the young wood has 

 ripened, and the leaves begin to fall, the lateral shoots should 

 be cut back to within one bud of the base, and if the spurs 

 thus formed along the main stem become too crowded, they 

 should be thinned out to a foot apart. By this means C. grandi- 

 florum has been made to bloom, which is one of the shyest 

 flowerers of the genus." * 



1. C. comosum. A large climbing shrub, admirably adapted 

 for covering an arbour or archway ; forms a delightful ornament 

 during the Cold season, when a perfect mass of bloom with its 

 countless large, compact, brush-like clusters of bright-crimson 

 flowers. 



2. C. rotundifolium. A large rambling shrub; bears dull 

 white flowers, not at all interesting. 



* 'Book of the Garden,' vol. ii. p. 717. 



