September 13, 1893.] 



Garden and Forest. 



383 



the stem and an open corolla of a deep rich blue. Always ex- 

 cepting the Fringed Gentian, this is our most handsome spe- 

 cies. The Sabbatias, too, are still beautiful among the Sedges 

 and Grasses in the wet Pines. Both S. stellaris and S. gracilis 

 are delicate and slender, and while they have a unique charm 

 here on account of their appropriate setting amid their wild 

 surroundings, one who studies them here can get many a hint 

 for their effective use in decorating house-grounds. The 

 white-flowered S. lanceolata is also here, but with its flat- 

 topped cyme it is stiff and unattractive compared with its more 

 graceful relatives. The Mist-flower, Eupatorium (Conoclini- 

 um) coelestinum, has also a flat-topped inflorescence, but no 

 one would charge its ageratum-like flowers with being stiff. 



Our tall Swamp Lily, which well deserves its name Super- 

 bum, is now at its best, and its showy flowers tower above their 

 humble companions in a grand pyramid of orange and scarlet. 

 It is certainly one of the stateliest of Lilies. The Rose Mallow, 

 the large flowering Hibiscus Moscheutos, also makes an im- 

 pressive display of its great pink and white blossoms, which 

 are larger and quite as showy as the cultivated Hollyhock, and 

 many of them opening high above our heads. But the plant 

 is rather coarse, or at least less graceful and delicate than the 

 lower plants and Grasses around and below it. Still it attracts 

 the attention of the most careless observer, and it is an impor- 

 tant feature in many of our swamps and woodland-landscapes. 



Both species of Trichostema, or Blue-curls, are here, with 

 blue flowers and long exserted slender stamens prettily curled, 

 from which peculiarity is derived the botanical as well as the 

 common name of these plants. The foliage has a pleasant 

 odor, like most of the other plants of the Mint family. Several 

 of its relatives are now in flower. Among them is the strong- 

 scented Horse-mint, Monarda punctata, gay with the highly 

 colored bracts about its heads of flowers. 



The brilliant scarlet of the Cardinal-flower glowing in the dis- 

 tance always indicates that we are approaching a pond, for it is by 

 water margins that these plants flourish in the greatest abun- 

 dance and brightness. None of our wild flowers are more 

 vivid, and they never appear to better advantage than when 

 they stand with an expanse of water dotted with white Pond- 

 lilies on one side, and on the other a border of Sedges and 

 Grasses and the delicate plants which they shelter. A slender 

 little relative of the Cardinal is Lobelia spicata, with small blue 

 flowers, and weak slender stems upheld by the Grasses. An- 

 other is L. puberula, with a stouter stem and a spike of large 

 handsome blue flowers. And here, too, is the marsh Bell- 

 flower, Campanula aparinoides, with dainty white bells scat- 

 tered over the weak straggling plant, and holding on to the 

 tall Grasses with the rough edges of its stems. 



Along the border of the pond is Coreopsis rosea, with rose- 

 colored rays and yellow disk. Some of the flowers are almost 

 as handsome as the rose-colored Sabbatias. In the shallow 

 water several forms of Sagittaria mingle with the Pickerel- 

 weed. The pure white blossoms of the one and the blue of 

 the other always group with good effect. The curious Eel- 

 grass, Vallisneria spiralis, is now in flower. The water is so 

 clear that we can see the staminate buds at the base of the 

 long grass-like leaves two or three feet below the surface. 

 Slightly agitating the plants we see the buds break from the 

 short flower-scape and quickly come to the surface, where 

 they soon expand to shed their pollen on the pistillate flowers, 

 which are now raised to the surface on long spirally coiled 

 stems to meet the loosened staminate flowers which are float- 

 ing around them. After fertilization the thread-like stems be- 

 come more closely coiled, so that the seed may ripen under 

 water. Sdll more curious is the Bladderwort or Utricularia, of 

 which there are several species here in the pond. Thickly 

 scattered over the submerged stems are little bladders or utri- 

 cles. We can see with the unaided eye untold numbers of 

 small mosquito-larvse, and also of the Chironomus caught in 

 these utricles, never to be released, but to be slowly macerated 

 and apparently absorbed by the plant. But we need the micro- 

 scope to reveal the wonderful mechanism and structure of the 

 utricles and to see how the various victims are caught and 

 held. 



Vioeland, N.J. Mary Treat. 



Notes on the Forest Flora of Japan. — XXI. 



OSTRYA, the Hop Hornbeam, appears in eastern 

 America with one species, one of the commonest of 

 the smaller forest-trees of the northern states ; the second 

 species inhabits southern Europe, Asia Minor and the Cau- 

 casus ; the genus has no representative in the Himalya 

 forest-region, and, so far as I know, has not been found 



within the borders of the Chinese Empire or in Manchuria. 

 It appears again in northern Japan, however, where the 

 Hop Hornbeam is one of the rarest of Yezo trees. Maxi- 

 mowicz, who found it in the southern part of that island, 

 considered the Japanese Ostrya a variety of our American 

 species and called it Ostrya Virginica, van Japonica.* The 

 American and the Japanese trees are very similar in botan- 

 ical characters ; indeed, it is difficult to find characters to 

 separate satisfactorily the species of this genus which might 

 all be considered geographical varieties of one. The Japa- 

 nese and American trees, however, look very differently 

 in the forest, and there are differences in the bark which 

 are not easy to express in words. The leaves of the Japa- 

 nese tree are thinner and the heads of fruit are smaller 

 than those on the American species (see figure on page 

 384). Unfortunately, I have not had an opportunity to ex- 

 amine the flowers of the Japanese tree ; it is not probable, 

 however, that they would atford a character by which the 

 species could be distinguished. In the forests of Yezo I 

 felt no doubt of its specific distinctness ; the meagre and 

 unsatisfactory material of the herbarium rather shakes than 

 confirms this opmion. But, all things considered, it is, per- 

 haps, best to consider the Japanese tree as specifically dis- 

 tinct. Only after it has been grown here during many 

 years side by side with the American species will it be 

 possible to reach any opinion on this subject worthy of 

 much consideration. If it proves to be distinct it should 

 bear the name of Ostrya Japonica. In the neighborhood 

 of Sapparo the Japanese Ostrya is rare ; here in low moist 

 woods, growing with Oaks, Acanthopanax and Aralia, it 

 sometimes attains a height of eighty feet and forms a tall 

 straight trunk eighteen inches in diameter. We saw only 

 one such tree, in the grounds attached to the headquarters 

 of the Forest Department of Hokkaido, and only two or 

 three other individuals ; these were much smaller, perhaps 

 not more than twenty feet high, and were scattered over 

 the Sapparo hills. We saw nothing of this tree in southern 

 Yezo or in northern Hondo, where Tschonoski, iVIaximo- 

 wicz's servant and collector, found it in the high mountains 

 of the province of Nambu. 



Although poorer in species and less important in the 

 number, size and value of individuals than in eastern 

 America, Quercus furnishes one of the principal elements 

 of the forests of Japan. The types are all of the Old World, 

 and there is nothing in Japan which corresponds with our 

 Red, Black or Scarlet Oaks, or with the Black Jack, the 

 Willow Oak, the Shingle Oak, the Turkey Oak, the Span- 

 ish Oak, the Water Oak or the Pin Oak, the Blue Jack, or 

 with our Chestnut Oaks. In the north and on the high 

 mountains of Hondo there are four White Oaks, and in the 

 south a number of species with evergreen foliage of sec- 

 tions of the genus, which are not represented in the United 

 States. In the south, too, there are a couple of deciduous- 

 leaved species with biennial fructification of the Turkey 

 Oak (Quercus cerris) sort. 



The best known of the Japanese Oaks to European and 

 American planters is Quercus dentata (the Quercus Daimio 

 of gardens). This tree is remarkable for the great size of 

 its leaves, which are often a foot long and eight inches 

 broad, obovate in outline and deeply serrately lobed, and 

 for the long, loose, narrow, chestnut-brown scales of the 

 large cup which nearly encloses the small-pointed acorn. 

 In central Hondo this tree is only found on the high moun- 

 tains, and it is not at all common, but in the extreme 

 northern part of the island it appears in great numbers on 

 dry gravelly slopes, at no great elevation above the sea. 

 Here, apparently, however, it does not reach the size it 

 attains farther north, and the finest trees we saw were on 

 the gravelly plain south of Volcano Bay and in the neigh- 

 borhood of Sapparo. The illustration on page 386 repre- 

 sents a group of these trees growing just outside of Sap- 

 paro and shows their habit at maturity. Although Quercus 

 dentata grows to the height of at least eighty feet and forms 



* Mi!l. Biol., xi., 317. 



