ADDISONIA 5 
(Plate 43) 
BENTHAMIA JAPONICA 
Japanese Flowering Dogwood 
Native of Japan and China 
Family CoRNACEAE Docwoop Family 
Benthamia japonica Sieb. & Zuce. Fl. Jap. 1: 38. pl. 16. 1837. 
Cornus Kousa Buerger; (Mig. Ann. Mus. Bot. Lugd. 2: 159, assynonym. 1865) 
Franch, & Sav. Enum. Pl. Jap. 1: 196. 1875. 
Cornus japonica Koehne, Deutsche Dendr. 438. 1893. Not Cornus japonica 
788. 
Benthamia Kousa Nakai, Bot. Mag. Tokyo 23: 41. 1909, 
A shrub or small tree with spreading branches, sometimes at- 
taining a height of twenty feet. The leaves, which are opposite 
and on very short stalks, are oval to elliptic-ovate, wedge-shaped 
or rounded at the base, sharp-pointed at the apex, two to four inches 
ong and one and a half to two inches wide. ‘They are appressed- 
pubescent on both surfaces, especially the lower, dark green above 
and paler beneath; the nerves are curved, their upper axils on the 
lower surface usually with brown hairs. The flowers, which appear 
after the leaves, are in heads, one quarter to three eighths of an 
inch in diameter, subtended by usually four spreading, ovate, 
sharp-pointed, cream-white bracts up to one and a half inches long 
e quarte 
Of all the trees which adorn our woodlands in the spring, none 
exceeds in beauty and attractiveness the flowering dogwood, 
Cynoxylon floridum. Its mantle of white makes of it a striking 
feature, when many other trees are in their uniform of green. ‘The 
flowering dogwood of Japan is equally striking, though perhaps not 
of so great stature, and must be one of the most admired of all the 
trees and shrubs of the wooded mountains of Japan, where it grows 
usually at elevations between 2000 and 4000 feet. Unlike our 
flowering dogwood, its blossoms appear after the leaves, the 
contrast of the white starry blossoms with the dark green of the 
foliage at once arresting the attention. In the fruticetum collection 
