MIDSEASON FLOWERING TREES AND SHRUBS 45 



ascending and form a narrow head. The flowers are 

 saucer-shaped, white with a mass of yellow stamens; 

 they are very freely produced and the tree is strikingly 

 ornamental. Its eastern North American relative (S. 

 pentagyna) which is native of the southern Appalachian 

 region, is a tall shrub with larger, more cup-shaped 

 flowers which appear about mid-July. Both these 

 Stewartias are hardy as far north as Boston. A near 

 and equally hardy relative of these is Gordonia al- 

 tamaha, one of the most beautiful and most interesting 

 of late-flowering American plants. It is a shrub from 

 fifteen to twenty feet high with obovate-oblong leaves 

 and pure white cup or saucer-shaped flowers with con- 

 spicuous yellow stamens which are produced from 

 August to late September. It was discovered in the 

 region of the Altamaha River, in Georgia, by John 

 Bartram, in 1765, and introduced by his son William 

 into England in 1774, but all plants now in cultivation 

 are from his second collection in 1778. No one has 

 seen this plant wild since 1790. 



Other late-flowering trees worthy of a place in 

 gardens are Rhus javanica (better known as R. 

 Osbeckii or R. semialata), Clerodendron trichotomum, 

 and C. trichotomum, var. Fargesii, all three native of 

 China and Japan. Unfortunately the two Cleroden- 

 drons are not hardy as far north as Boston, Mass. 



