THE KINGDOM OF FLOWERS 
Royal Horticultural Society of London 
and others, completed the work of his 
predecessors and exhausted the gardens 
of China to our lasting benefit; but the 
difficulties of travel were such that he 
had practically no opportunity to investi- 
gate the natural wild flora. With the 
exception of perhaps half a dozen plants, 
everything he sent home came from gar- 
dens. But one of his wildlings—Rhodo- 
dendron Fortunei, to wit—has proved of 
inestimable value to rhododendron breed- 
ers across the water. 
Charles Maries, collecting on behalf of 
the London house of Veitch, in 1870, 
ascended the Yang-tse as far as Ichang. 
He found the natives there were un- 
friendly, and, after staying a week, 
during which time he secured Primula 
obconica, one of the most valuable plants 
of today, felt compelled to return. Near 
Kiukiang he secured Hamamelis mollis, 
Loropetalum chinense, and a few other 
plants of less value, and then hied him- 
self away to Japan. 
For some curious reason or other he 
concluded that Robert Fortune had ex- 
hausted China, and, most extraordinary 
of all, his conclusions were accepted! 
When at Ichang, had he gone some three 
days’ journey north, south, or west he 
would have secured a haul of new plants 
such as the botanical and horticultural 
world had never dreamed could possibly 
exist anywhere on this planet. By the 
irony of fate it was left for two or three 
others to discover and accomplish, at a 
later date, what was almost within his 
grasp. 
The enormous population, especially 
in the vicinity of the Lower Yang-tse 
and its vast alluvial delta and plains, no 
doubt misled Charles Maries, as it has 
done others. So densely is China popu- 
lated that every bit of suitable land has 
been developed under agriculture. A 
Chinese is calculated to get more returns 
from a given piece of land than the most 
expert agriculturist in any other coun- 
try. Dry farming and intensive cultiva- 
tion, though unknown to them under 
these terms, have been practiced by Chi- 
nese from time immemorial. The land 
1009 
is never idle; they are always tilling and 
manuring the soil. Nevertheless, in spite 
of their almost incredible industry, much 
of the land in the wild mountain fast- 
nesses of central and western China de- 
fies agricultural skill, and in these re- 
gions a surprisingly rich and varied flora 
obtains. ‘These parts are very sparsely 
populated, difficult of access, and, until 
comparatively recently, totally unknown 
to the outside world. 
The botanical collections of Fathers 
David and Delavay, and of Augustine 
Henry, of the Maritime Customs, gave 
the first true insight into the extra- 
ordinary richness of the flora of central 
and western China. Delavay’s collection 
alone totaled about 3,000 species, and 
Henry’s almost if not quite equalled it! 
Botanists were simply astounded by the 
wealth of new species and new genera 
in these collections. A completely new 
light was thrown on many problems, and 
the headquarters of several genera—for 
example, Rhododendron, Lilium, Pri- 
mula, Pyrus, Rubus, Rosa, Vitis, etc.— 
heretofore attributed elsewhere, was. 
shown to be China. 
SOME OF CHINA’S BROAD-LEAVED EVER- 
GREENS ARE MUCH DESIRED 
FOR AMERICA 
There is a greater variety of trees, 
for example, in China than in the whole 
of North America. In the matter of 
ornamental shrubs, it is China first and 
the temperate floras of other lands no- 
where! 
The flora of China is, generally speak- 
ing, a temperate flora, and its great in- 
terest and value lies in the fact that it is 
rich in ornamental trees and shrubs emi- 
nently suitable for outdoor cultivation in 
parks and gardens of this country and 
Europe. Though a few will withstand 
our bleakest and severest climate and 
many are suitable to the climate of our 
warmer States, the majority find them- 
selves at home in New England, where 
the climate is no more severe than in 
Massachusetts. As far as deciduous 
trees and shrubs are concerned, our hot 
