28 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 256. 



five in eastern America and seven in Japan, are repre- 

 sented by trees in one region and by shrubs only in the 

 other. Of endemic arborescent genera the silva of eastern 

 America contains Asimina, KoeberUnia, Cliftonia, Ungnar- 

 dia, Robinia, Cladrastis, Pinckneya, Oxydendrum, Halesia, 

 Sassafras, Planera, Hicoria and Taxodium, thirteen, while 

 in Japan there are only six — Euptelia, Cercidiphyllum, Tro- 

 codendron, Platycarya, Cryptomeria and Sciadopitys. 



Such a comparison between the silvas of eastern America 

 and Japan is interesting as showing the great number of 

 arborescent species inhabiting four small islands. The sig- 

 nificant comparison, however, if it can ever be made, will 

 be between eastern America, as here limited, and all of 

 eastern Asia from the northern limits of tree-growth to the 

 tropics, and from the eastern rim of the Thibetan plateau 

 to the eastern coast of Japan. This would include Corea, 

 practically an unexplored country botanically, especially 

 the northern portions, and all the mountain-ranges of west- 

 ern China, a region, if it is to be judged from the collec- 

 tions made there in recent years, far richer in trees than 

 Japan itself It is impossible to discuss with precision or 

 with much satisfaction the distribution of ligneous plants of 

 the north temperate zone until more is known of western 

 China and of Corea, where may be sought the home of many, 

 plants now spread through eastern China and Japan, and 

 where alone the enterprising and industrious collector may 

 now hope to be rewarded with new forms of ligneous 

 vegetation. C. S. S. 



New or Little-known Plants. 



Salix balsamifera. 



AMONG the shrubby Willows of eastern America there 

 is, perhaps, not one more desirable as a garden-plant 

 than this species, of which a figure from a drawing made 

 by Mr. Faxon in the Arnold Arboretum, is published on 

 page 29 of this issue. 



Salix balsamifera is a stout much-branched shrub, grow- 

 ing, under favorable conditions, to the height of eight or 

 ten feet, forming clumps of some size, and conspicuous 

 from the lustrous young shoots which on the side exposed 

 to the sun are bright chestnut-brown. The leaves are 

 lanceolate to ovate-lanceolate, two to four inches in length, 

 acute or acuminate, broadly rounded and usually some- 

 what cordate at the base, slightly glandular-serrate, and 

 long-stalked ; when they appear they are thin, nearly trans- 

 parent, and bright red, but later become thick and rigid, 

 dark green on the upper, and pale and prominently 

 reticulate-veined on the lower surface. The stipules are 

 minute or abortive. The flower-clusters are borne on slen- 

 der leafy stalks. The male flowers are thickly clothed with 

 pale silky hairs, and are conspicuous from the rose-colored 

 scales and from the anthers, which are at first red, but later 

 become bright yellow. The female aments, which are 

 from two to two and a half inches in length, are less silky, 

 and become lax in fruit. 



Salix balsamifera inhabits open swamps ; it is scattered 

 along the northern borders of the United States from Maine 

 to Minnesota, and extends north into British America. 



The history of this plant, as told by Mr. M. S. Bebb in the 

 Bulleiin of the Torrey Botanical Cluh (xv., 122), is interest- 

 ing. In the spring of 1879, in looking over the collection 

 of Willows in the Herbarium of the Philadelphia Academy 

 of Natural Science, he discovered a few leaves which had 

 been collected in the White Mountains more than half a 



century before. The label read : "Salix .? Bank of 



Ammonoosuc, White Hills, N. H., H. Little, August, 1823." 

 This fragmentary specimen he recognized as Salix balsami- 

 fera, and realized that it was the earliest collection of the 

 species, as the specimens of the English collectors, Drum- 

 mond and Richardson, made in British America, upon 

 which the species was founded, were made later, as were 

 the specimens from which Andersson, the Swedish botanist, 

 described his Salix pyrifolia, which is only another name 

 for Salix balsamifera. 



Mr. Bebb communicated his discovery to Mr. Pringle, 

 who was at that time particularly interested in the flora of 

 the White Mountains. In company with C. E. Faxon, 

 Pringle scoured the banks of the Ammonoosuc for Little's 

 Willow, but without success. After having given up the 

 hunt and returned to the Crawford House, they accident- 

 ally stumbled on the missing plant growing on the banks 

 of the Saco River, not five minutes' walk from the hotel, 

 where for the last fifty years it had remained unnoticed. A 

 fortnight later, Mr. Edwin Faxon "succeeded in finding 

 another clump of females on the south branch of the Am- 

 monoosuc, about three-quarters of a mile from Mr. Prin- 

 gle's habitat, and a very fine clump of males on the 

 east branch of the same stream, about four miles further 

 north, very near the railroad to the Fabyan House, at the 

 base of Mount Washington." In subsequent years Mr. 

 Edwin Faxon detected this plant in a number of localities 

 in the White Mountains, especially in the neighborhood of 

 Franconia, where "it is common in and around the large 

 swamps." 



In 1880, Salix balsamifera was introduced into the Arnold 

 Arboretum, where it is perfectly established, the two sexes 

 flowering freely every year, and where it is one of the 

 most beautiful and distinct of the shrubby Willows in 

 the collection. C. S. S. 



Foreign Correspondence. 

 London Letter. 



Urceocharis Clibrani and Bigeneric Hybrids. — The pro- 

 duction of a genuine hybrid from two plants recognized as 

 members of distinct genera is an occurrence of some in- 

 terest, both to botanists and cultivators. The last case of 

 this kind is that of Urceocharis Clibrani, the history of 

 which is as follows : In July last, Messrs. Clibran & Son, 

 of Altrincham, Cheshire, exhibited, under the name of 

 Eucharis Clibrani, flowers which they said were from a 

 plant raised by them from Eucharis grandiflora and Urceo- 

 lina aurea. The flowers attracted little notice at the time, 

 but a few weeks later, Dr. Masters published in the Gar- 

 deners' Chronicle a figure and description of Messrs. Cli- 

 brans' plant, which he had renamed as above, the generic 

 name being a compound of that of the two parents. A few 

 days ago Messrs. Clibran sent flowers of the plant to Kew 

 for examination, and Mr. Baker is satisfied that it is a hy- 

 brid from the two parents named. The general habit of 

 the plant appears to be like that of the Eucharis, the leaves 

 being as large, the scape stout and eighteen inches long, 

 bearing an umbel of eight flowers. In the flowers, how- 

 ever, we get some evidences of the Urceolina, the lower 

 part of the tube being slender, the upper urceolate or cam- 

 panulate, and the segments recurved at the tip. As a gar- 

 den-plant this hybrid is likely to prove useful, the flowers 

 being pure white, graceful, three inches long and two inches 

 across the mouth. The buds are white, with green tips. 

 The plants appear to bloom freely and frequently, Messrs. 

 Clibran having had them in flower in July, August, and 

 again in December. 



The question arises. Are we to accept the Urceocharis as 

 a genuine bigeneric hybrid, or to look upon it as conclu- 

 sive evidence that the parents belong to one genus ? Dean 

 Herbert held the view that bigeneric hybrids were impos- 

 sible, the occurrence of so-called hybrids being presump- 

 tive evidence that botanists had been mistaken with regard 

 to the genera concerned. 



The only other recorded case in Amaryllidaceae is that 

 of Cyrtanthus hybridus, which was bred in the garden of 

 Sir Trevor Lawrence, from Cyrtanthus sanguineus and Val- 

 lota purpurea. Mr. N. E. Brown, of Kew, who described 

 and named this plant in 1885, and whose knowledge of 

 Cape plants is probably unsurpassed, said of it, "I think 

 this plant can scarcely be claimed as an example of a 

 hybrid between two distinct genera, but rather as proving a 

 view that I have held for some time, namely, that Cyrtan- 

 thus and Vallota are not really distinct genera, but merely 



