394 WILSON EXPEDITION TO CHINA 



general appearance. Thea Sasanqua is exceedingly common throughout the 

 warmer parts of Japan, forming a large wide-spreading bush and in the extreme 

 south a small tree. The branches are very slender and wide-spreading and in the 

 wild plant the flowers are always white. It is a popular garden shrub and under 

 cultivation forms with pink and rose-colored flowers are common. Doubtless 

 the pink-flowered plant Kaempfer {Amoen. Exot. 853 [1712]) was familiar with was 

 cultivated. The Japanese plant is valued chiefly as an ornamental garden shrub, 

 though the seeds do contain an inferior sort of oil formerly and possibly still used by 

 women for dressing their hair. But the oil chiefly used in Japan and most highly 

 valued foi this purpose is that expressed from the seeds of Thea japonica. Oil from 

 the seed of the Tea plant {Thea sinensis Linnaeus) is also used for the same purpose. 

 Very probably the oils in the seeds of T. Sasanqua and T. oleifera diiTer in their 

 chemical composition, as their uses in the two countries are so different. 



In regard to Loureiro's Thea oleosa, the native names given belong to T. oleifera 

 and the substance of his note applies to this plant, but the description obviously 

 applies to the common Tea plant {T. sinensis Linnaeus). Seemann (1. c), although 

 he interprets the facts differently, says " what is preserved in the Parisian Museum 

 as the original specimen of Thea oleosa Loureiro is Thea chinensis, var. Bohea." 

 We can appreciate the diflSculties under which Loureiro worked, and it is easy to 

 understand the possibihty of his describing one plant in the firm belief that it 

 was another of quite different economic value. 



A picture of Thea oleifera will be found under No. 0253 of the collection of 

 Wilson's photographs. 



Thea Grijsii Kochs in Bot. Jahrb. XXVII. 591 (1900). — Pritzel in 

 Bot. Jahrh. XXIX. 473 (1900). 



Camellia Grijsii Hance in Jour. Bot. XVII. 9 (1879). — Hemsley in Jour. 



Linn. Soc. XXIII. 81 (1886). 

 Thea Grijsii O. Kuntze, Rev. Gen. PI. I. 65 (1891). — Szyszylowicz in Engler, 



Nat. Pflanzenfam. III. Abteil. 6, 183 (1893). 



Western Hupeh: Ichang, glens, alt. 30-100 m., January 1909 

 (No. 22o6; bush 2-3 m., flowers white); same locality, A. Henry 

 (No. 3335); without locality, A. Henry (No. 7921). Western 

 Szech'uan: Kiating Fu, thickets, alt. 1100 m., October 1908 (No. 

 2204; bush 2-2.5 m.). 



This shrub is fairly common at low altitudes in Hupeh and Szech'uan, where it 

 flowers at midwinter. The petioles and the lower part of the midrib on both 

 sides and the upper part of the shoots are often more or less hairy. 



Though closely related to T. oleifera, Grijs's plant may be distinguished in the 

 herbarium by its much more prominently veined and more sharply serrate leaves, 

 by the short, dense, closely appressed pubescence on the winter-buds, by its very 

 deeply cleft petals, more united filaments and by its shorter style. The fruit is 

 also larger and less distinctly globose in shape. 



GORDONIA Ell. 



Gordonia axillaris Szyszylowicz in Engler & Prantl, Nat. Pflanzen- 

 fam. III. Abteil. 6, 185 (1893). 



