384 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 448. 



allies of similar habit and larger flowers of a darker shade 

 of yellow. These are three good-natured plants, growing 

 and flowering freely under even makeshift treatment. 



Bignoxias. — These include the popular Bignonia speciosa 

 and B. purpurea, the latter a beautiful summer-flowering 

 climber with flowers of a rich purple color. B. Tweediana 

 has small leaves, and its numerous shoots hang elegantly 

 so as to form a screen or curtain which in summer is 

 studded with large golden-yellow flowers. B. venusta is a 

 glorious plant when happily situated in a sunny interme- 

 diate house, producing large racemes of bright scarlet 

 flowers. 



Bougainvilleas. ■ — We have now four distinct sorts, 

 namely, Bougainvillea spectabilis and its variety lateritia, 

 and B. glabra and its floriferous form named Sanderiana. 

 These are essentially sun-loving plants, and when in suita- 

 ble positions they make a magnificent and lasting display 

 during the summer. 



Clerodendrons. — Most stove collections contain Clero- 

 dendron Thomsona? and the hybrid C. speciosum, but the 

 bright blood-red C. splendens is a rare plant as yet. C. 

 volubile, with very dark crimson flowers, is also rare. 

 Trained to three or four wires stretched parallel with a 

 rafter and grown on what is called the short-spur system, 

 these plants form most effective masses of flowers. 



Dipladenias. — These should be grown in a hot moist 

 house and their stems trained on strings till the flower- 

 buds appear, when they may be transferred to a show 

 house and trained round pillars or in any position where 

 their beautiful flowers may be seen. They are now a 

 great attraction in one of the stoves at Kew. Dipladenias 

 require very sandy peat and should be potted lightly. 

 They cannot bear sourness of soil or excessive watering. 

 After flowering they should be rested in a dry house. 



Passifloras. — The best of these now in flower at Kew are 

 Passiflora alata, flowers four inches across, crimson, with 

 a very conspicuous blue and white corona ; P. racemosa 

 (princeps), with pendent racemes of brick-red flowers ; P. 

 Raddiana (Kermesina), a most elegant little plant with 

 bright crimson flowers ; P. Watsoni, of similar habit to the 

 last, the flowers of two shades of lavender and very fra- 

 grant ; P. violacea, with flowers as large as those of P. 

 ccerulea, colored violet-purple, with an almost black co- 

 rona ; P. vitifolia, with scarlet flowers. 



Thunbergia laurifolia, T. grandiflora and its white- 

 flowered variety are three first-rate plants for producing 

 bold effects of foliage and flower. Their ally, Hexacentris 

 Mysorensis, is a superb plant for a rafter, its thin, pliant 

 stems being easily trained or festooned, and the long, 

 graceful, pendent racemes of orange-red and yellow flow- 

 ers being exceptionally charming. 



Ipomcea ternata. — Three distinct plants are included 

 under this name, all of them first-rate garden plants. They 

 are what are known in gardens as Ipomoea Horsfalliae, 

 with flowers in clusters and colored rich crimson ; I. 

 Thompsoni, sometimes called the White Horsfalliee, and I. 

 Lady Briggs, which has smaller brighter-colored flowers 

 than the last-named and is more easily managed. It 

 flowers in midwinter and is a most useful stove-plant. I. 

 paniculata (Batatas), with annual stems and large rosy- 

 mauve flowers ; I. tuberosa, somewhat similar in growth to 

 the last, but yellow-flowered, and I. rubro-ccerulea, the 

 winter-flowering stove annual, which every one grows or 

 ought to grow, are the best of the Ipomoeas. 



Beaumontia grandiflora. — This large woody climber 

 grows freely under ordinary stove treatment, but it does 

 not always flower satisfactorily. I have never seen it 

 flowered well near London, and I attribute this to the bad 

 effects of fog upon the flowers in winter. But in gardens 

 in the country I have seen plants heavily laden with enor- 

 mous clusters of large trumpet-shaped, pure white, fragrant 

 flowers, quite equal in elegance and purity to those of 

 Lilium longiflorum. 



Mucuna atropurpurea is a vigorous climber, not unlike a 

 Scarlet Runner, and its black-purple flowers are borne in 



clusters on slender drooping stalks in such a manner as to 

 resemble large bunches of grapes. 



Oxera pulchella is allied to the Clerodendrons and .pro- 

 duces large axillary racemes of white tubular flowers. 

 Roupellia grata, the Cream-fruit of Madagascar, has shining 

 Laurel-like leaves and Allamanda-like flowers of a dark 

 crimson and yellow color. Gmelina hystrix has the habit 

 of Bougainvillea, and bears large, yellow trumpet-shaped 

 flowers in clusters springing from a cone-like arrangement 

 of large brown-purple bracts. Solandra grandiflora grows 

 rampantly in any tropical house, but only develops its 

 large white Datura-like trumpets when exposed to bright 

 sunshine in a rather dry house. Gloriosa is a beautiful 

 little genus, and when properly managed its elegant spider- 

 like red and yellow flowers are very attractive. Clitoria 

 ternata is worth growing in every stove for the sake of the 

 rich gentian-blue of its large pea-like flowers. Arauja 

 grandiflora (Schubertia) is as effective as Stephanotis flori- 

 bunda, and is as easily grown. Stigmaphyllon ciliatum 

 and the Manettias bicolor and cordifolia also deserve men- 

 tion for their free growth and attractive flowers. 



London. W, WatSOIl. 



Plant Notes. 



Evonymus obovatus. 



THIS plant, which is a native of Canada and of the 

 northern and middle states, has usually been consid- 

 ered a form of Evonymus Americanus. It differs, how- 

 ever, from that species in its prostrate or semiprostrate 

 branches, much smaller and earlier flowers, and, as Nuttall 

 pointed out in his Genera of North American Plants, is best 

 considered a species. 



Evonymus obovatus has been used with excellent effect 

 in the Arnold Arboretum to form a carpet under larger 

 plants and to border the margins of shrub-beds. It grows 

 well in the shade and the full light of the sun. Its cheerful 

 light yellow-green foliage is attractive throughout the sea- 

 son ; it is very hardy, free from insect enemies, and when 

 once established grows rapidly into broad dense mats of 

 long, spreading, slender stems. The purple flowers are 

 not conspicuous, but they are followed by fruit covered 

 with prickles and seeds surrounded by showy scarlet arils. 



Our illustration, on page 385 of this issue, will, perhaps, 

 serve to attract the attention of gardeners to the horticul- 

 tural value of this much-negdected shrub. 



Physalis Francheti. — Last year Mr. Watson spoke of 

 this as a beautiful border plant with Chinese-lanterndike 

 fruits of a bright orange-red. Early this year we called at- 

 tention to a colored illustration of it in The Garden, in which 

 the brilliant balloon-shaped calyx, seven or eight inches in 

 circumference, made a striking picture, and these fairy-like 

 balloons were said to remain bright after they had been cut 

 a year. It is a near relative of the old-fashioned Winter 

 Cherry, Physalis Alkekengi, which is not at all uncommon 

 in American gardens, and it was introduced by the Veitches, 

 of Chelsea, from Japan in 1894. Mr. Michael Barker writes 

 that seeds of the same plant were also received from Japan 

 by Mr. John Lewis Childs, of Floral Park, where it lias 

 been grown extensively and proves to be a meritorious 

 plant. In Mr. Childs' garden it grows from twelve to eigh- 

 teen inches high, erect and densely branched with smooth 

 stems well furnished with ovate, acuminate leaves, the 

 largest of which are six inches long. The dull white flow- 

 ers with greenish centre are not showy, and are borne 

 singly on short pedicels in the axils of the leaves. The in- 

 flated calyces are three inches in diameter when fully grown, 

 and they then turn from their original to the vivid colors 

 we have described. Since it is said to be hardy in England 

 it is probable that the new plant is a perennial like P. Al- 

 kekengi, but it has been treated by Mr. Childs so far as an 

 annual, and its hardiness and duration here remain to be 

 tested. Plants raised under cover and set out in the open 



