344 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 286. 



cies is very similar, but the Japanese tree flowers in the 

 spring, ripening its fruit in the autumn of the same year, 

 while the American tree flowers in the autumn and does 

 not perfect its fruit until a year later. The figure of Alnus 

 Japonica which appears on page 345 of this issue has been 

 made from a drawing of a wild specimen gathered in Yezo, 

 and appears to be the first which has been published. 



Alnus Japonica is sometimes found in our collections, and 

 is generally cultivated under the name of Alnus firma. 

 It is perfectly hardy in New England, where it grows 

 rapidly, and promises to become a large and handsome 

 tree. The true Alnus firma, which is largely planted along 

 the margins of the Rice-fields near Tokyo to afford sup- 

 port for the poles on which the freshly cut rice is hung to 

 dry, was not seen growing under what appeared natural 

 conditions; bat the beautitul mountain-tree, distinguished 

 by the thick conspicuously veined leaves, which has been 

 considered a variety of Alnus firma (var. multinervis), we 

 often saw on the mountains of Hondo, where it grows on 

 dry rocky soil and reaches elevations of some five thousand 

 feet above the sea-level. It is a graceful tree, sometimes 

 twenty or thirty feet high, with slender spreading branches 

 and thin flexible branchlets covered with ample, thick, 

 dark green, acute leaves with from sixteen to twenty-four 

 pairs of pale conspicuous straight veins. When better 

 known, this handsome tree will probably prove to be speci- 

 fically distinct, and a garden-plant of value. 



What has been considered a form of Alnus viridis (var. 

 Sibirica) is a very distinct-looking plant in Japan, with 

 broadly ovate cordate leaves fully twice as large as those 

 produced by Alnus viridis in America or Europe. At high 

 elevations on Mount Hakkoda we found it growing as a 

 bushy tree from twenty to twenty-five feet tail, and form- 

 ing a short stout trunk. A review of all the known forms 

 of Alnus viridis will probably necessitate the separation 

 of the Japanese plant from it. C. S. S. 



Foreign Correspondence. 



London Letter. 



DiPLADENiA ExiMEA. — This is a new species lately intro- 

 duced by Messrs. Sander & Co., of St. Albans, who sent 

 flowers of it to Kew for determination. It is, I believe, 

 Brazifian, and, according to Mr. Hemsley, who describes 

 it in the Gardjiers' Chronicle, it is nearest to D. acuminata 

 of the Botanical Magazine, t. 4828. 1 saw the flowers and 

 can vouch for their exceeding beauty and distinctiveness 

 from every other species or variety of Dipladeuia known 

 in gardens. It is, of course, a climber, with broad, oval 

 dark green leaves less than two inches long, and clusters 

 of flowers, each between two and three inches in diameter 

 and colored deep rich rose, funnel-shaped, with short broad- 

 spreading, elegantly curved lobes, narrowed to an acute 

 point. Tne plants in Mr. Sander's nursery grow very freely, 

 and altogether I should be disposed to pronounce this 

 one of the very best of all known Dipladenias. The color 

 of the flowers is exquisite. 



DiPLADENiA Harrisii. — This is a very handsome stove- 

 climber, a large specimen of it in the Water-lily house at 

 Kew bearing several long shoots clothed with racemes of 

 large yellow AUamanda-like flowers, tinged with red at the 

 base of the lobes. It was discovered in Trinidad by Mr. 

 Purdie, who described it as " a fine plant, not surpassed 

 by any one of its congeners, whether we consider the size 

 and beauty and fragrance of its flowers of metallic lustre, 

 or its entire habit." It was named in honor of Lord Harris, 

 at that time Governor of Trinidad, and was first flow^ereci 

 by Messrs. Veitch in 1854. The leaves are large, some 

 being fully a foot long by four inches broad, and the plant 

 is a sturdy, quick grower, much more amenable to ordi- 

 nary treatment than the Dipladenias of the amabilis type. 

 In the Genera Plantarum, D. Harrisii is referred to the 

 genus Odontadenia. It is a first-rate garden-plant. 



BiGNONiA purpurea. — This is one of the most beautiful of 

 all stove-climbers, but it requires to be understood to be a 

 success. In the Palm-house at Kew it is trained against 

 the curvilinear roof, from which, at the present time, its 

 numerous shoots hang in great profusion, some of them 

 two yards long and clothed with large clusters of richest 

 purple-blue flowers, as large as those of B. speciosa, and 

 even more attractive. The leaves are bifoliate, bright 

 green, and the flowers are borne in the axils, as many as 

 a dozen flowers, in some cases, clustering about each pair 

 of leaves. Until we ceased to prune this plant in winter 

 it flowered only sparingly, but now that we leave all the 

 summer-grown shoots we get the effect above described- 

 Whatever pruning is necessary is done as soon as the flow- 

 ers are over. This species is not new, but it is so rarely 

 seen or heard of in cultivation that I venture to recommend 

 it strongly as a first-rate summer-flowering stove-climber. 



Cattleya Rex. — In my last letter I described a three- 

 flowered scape of this distinct and beautiful Cattleya which 

 was exhibited at Chiswick. This week I have seen two 

 more scapes, equally fine, from the collection of Mr. T. 

 Statler, at Manchester, and now I learn that Messrs. 

 Sander & Co. have "an importation, guaranteed true, 

 of this Cattleya, in superb order and condition. Some 

 of the plants are great masses, with old flower-spikes 

 equal in size to C. gigas Sanderiana, and showing nine and 

 ten flower-scars on each spike." These plants are to be 

 sold by auction in Messrs. Protherse & Morris' rooms in 

 Cheapside, on Friday, August 4th. At the same time this 

 firm will offer more plants of Eulophiella Elizabethae and 

 three new Cypripediums named Sargentii, Nicholsonianum 

 and Massaianum. Orchid fanciers are being exceptionally 

 well favored by the importations of new kinds this year. 



LiELiA MONOPHYLLA. — We have no more charming little 

 summer-flowering Orchid than this. At the present time 

 there are about a dozen examples of it in flower in the cool 

 Orchid-house at Kew, each bearing from six to a dozen 

 flowers of elegant butterfly form, and colored vivid orange- 

 scarlet. I have heard of a plant which bore three flowers 

 on a scape, but all of the plants at Kew have only a 

 single flower on each scape. The pseudo-bulbs are no 

 thicker than a knitting-needle, six inches long, each bear- 

 ing a single narrow leaf three inches long. The scape is 

 slender, curved, three inches long, and the flower is be- 

 tween one and two inches in diameter. The Kew exam- 

 ples have been in flower a fortnight, and the flowers are 

 still quite fresh. They are grown in a cool house along 

 with Masdevallias, and they get a fair supply of water all 

 the year round. This species was first introduced and 

 flowered at Kew in 1882, plants having been found by Mr. 

 Morris in Jamaica on St. Andrew's Mountain at an eleva- 

 tion of about 5,000 feet. Mr. Norman Cookson is trying 

 to cross it with other species of Lselia. 



EucRYPHiA piNNATiFOLiA. — A healthy plant five feet high, 

 planted as a specimen on a lawn at Ktw, has lately flow- 

 ered freely, no doubt owing to the hot weather experienced 

 here. It has also flowered exceptionally well this year in 

 Messrs. Veitchs' nursery at Coombe Wood, a photograph 

 taken recently showing a plant ten feet high covered with 

 large white single Rose-like flowers. It appears to be per- 

 fectly hardy in England, and is certain to become a general 

 favorite. It was introduced into cultivation by Messrs, 

 Veitch & Sons about fifteen years ago. According to Sir 

 Joseph Hooker, it is a very local plant, being confined, so 

 far as is known, to the Cordillera of Concepcion, in Chili, 

 where it forms a bushy tree ten feet high, and is called 

 "Nirrhe." Two years ago a second species, E. Billardieri, 

 a native of Tasmania, was flowered at Kew, and when de- 

 scribing it in the Botanical Magazine under t. 7200, Sir Jo- 

 seph Hooker, remarking upon the position of the genus, 

 says : " The fact is that Eucryphia has no hitherto recog- 

 nized, undoubted near relatives in the vegetable kingdom, 

 and having regard to the two most noticeable points in its 

 history and structure — namely, that it is confined to Chili 

 and Australia, and that of the three known species two 



