274 



Garden and Forest. 



[June 4, 189c. 



Andreanus. The s'anie firm also exhibited Picea excelsa muta- 

 I'ilis, remarkable for the bright yellow of its pendent young 

 growth, and Juniperus Canadensis aurea, the nut-like buds 

 colored yellow. Mr. Paul showed the white flowered variety 

 of Cydonia Japonica, Pieris (Andromeda) formosa, a pretty flow- 

 ered shrub, with panicles of white Lily-of-the- Valley-like flow- 

 ers; Prunus Sieboldii, one of the prettiest of spring-flowering 

 small trees, the rich crimson of the buds and rosy white of the 

 expanded flowers being most ornamental. At Kew this plant, 

 when in Mower, is greatly admired; the European Daphne Cneo- 

 rum, a gem amongst Daphnes, most useful for beds or as a mar- 

 ginal plant to borders; it is compact in habit, and produces pretty 

 little umbels of rosy red flowers, not unlike those of a Pimelia, 

 on the ends of the branches. 



A garden tastefully planted with the best of the trees and 

 shrubs shown at this meeting would be a perfect paradise in May. 



Other plants shown at the meeting were a grand collection 

 of Pceonia Motetan, from Messrs. Kelway & Son. Notable 

 amongst them were Fascinatus, an enormous flower, colored 

 pale lavender, splashed at the base of the petals with purple ; 

 M. S. Low, large, rich satin rose ; Beatrice, a single flowered 

 variety, eight inches across the cup, pure white with yellow 

 stamens and a purple stigma. This is the most beautiful of 

 all singled flowered Moutans. Caroline d'ltalie is another grand 

 variety, the flowers being large and cream colored, flushed 

 with rose. 



Calla Elliottiana is a very handsome yellow flowered variety 

 or species near to C. hastata or C. mactdata, the flower being 

 almost as large as that of C. AZthiopica, but colored bright ca- 

 nary-yellow. It is said to have come amongst some tubers of 

 various kinds of Calla imported from the Cape. Seedlings of it 

 have been raised, but they have not yet flowered. This plant 

 shared with the Cytisus the place of honor amongst the new 

 plants shown. If it proves as easy to cultivate and as prolific 

 in flowers as the old Nile Lily it will be of immense value as a 

 decorative plant. 



Amongst the Orchids the most interesting plants were Odon- 

 toglossum crispum virginale, with flowers four inches across 

 and pure white save a tinge of pale yellow on the lip; Cattleya 

 Warocqueana, a variety of C. IVarneri; Dendrobium Gallicea- 

 num, a pale-lipped, loose-flowered variety of D. thyrsiflorum 

 and Disa tripetaloides. This last is now flowering at Kew. It 

 has the habit of D. racemosa, but is smaller in stature, and the 

 flowers are white, spotted with purple; the spike is fifteen 

 inches high and bears nine flowers. It is an interesting and 

 pretty little Disa, and whilst falling a long way behind I). gran- 

 diflora and D. racemosa as a decorative plant it is nevertheless 

 worth a place amongst cool-house Orchids. Apparently it is 

 as easy to manage as the other two. 



Cypripedium ca%tdatum is variable both in the size and color 

 of its flowers. The finest I have seen came this week from 

 the Glasnevin Botanic Gardens. The length of the tails was 

 thirty-five inches, of each sepal seven inches and of the pouch 

 three inches, the width of the latter being nearly one and one- 

 half inches. The colors, too, weremuch superior to what one 

 commonly sees in this species. 



Catasetum Bungerothii, var. pileatum. A figure of this 

 grand Catasetum recently published in Sander's Reichenbachia, 

 is accompanied by some observations to the effect that the 

 name Bungerothii, given to this plant by Mr. N. G. Brown in 

 1886, must be superseded by that of C. pileatum, which Reich- 

 enbach had applied to the same plant some years before. I 

 believe there is every reason for assuming that Reichenbach 

 did do this, in fact he told me himself soon after Mr. Brown's 

 description of C. Bu ngerothii was published that he had already 

 named the same plant. 

 Kew. W. Watson. 



Cultural Department. 



Notes on American Plants. 



PHE first to bloom of our Butterfly Tulips is the little Calo- 

 *- chortus cosruleus from California. It grows only about six 

 inches high, bearing in not very long succession several white 

 flowers with a purplish centre, three-quarters of an inch wide, 

 with hairy bristles inside. It is quite pretty, but the flower 

 stems are too short for cutting. Only two or three days later 

 comes C. Benthami, a plantof about the same size with bright 

 yellow flowers, a fitting companion to the first. Our plants of 

 both were protected from the frost by a covering of leaves. 



Sedum ternatum, one of the Stone Crops, is valuable in parts 

 of the rockery. It likes shade, yet in a light soil it will thrive 

 in open sunlight. It grows about as high as Phlox subulata, 

 and like it forms dense beds so thick that nothing else can live 

 with it. Its dense, light green foliage is pretty, and when the 



small white flowers appear, which are borne on three-spiked 

 cymes, with the spikes almost horizontal and the flowers on 

 the upper side, the beds are quite showy. 



Many persons who are familiar with the common Chick- 

 weed (Stellaria media), which is a noxious weed in many gar- 

 dens, may hardly believe that its near relative, theGreatChick- 

 weed, 5. pubera, can have any value as a garden plant, yet 

 for a shady situation at its time of blooming there are few 

 prettier plants. It forms thick clumps a foot high and more 

 than a foot wide. All over these clumps, as thickly set as can 

 be, are the pretty white flowers, half an inch wide, sprinkled 

 with their reddish brown stamens. It is not inclined to spread 

 with us, at least like S. media, but seems to require no special 

 care when once established. 



The Wild Hyacinth (Camas sia Fraseri) comes from a bulb- 

 ous root with long, grass-like leaves, and bearing a long, 

 naked stem with a spike of pale blue flowers at the summit. 

 The flowers are more than half an inch wide and the spike 

 three inches long by nearly an inch thick. The plant is per- 

 fectly hardy, easy of culture and well worth growing. 



Iris verna, now in bloom, a little later than /. cristata, has 

 pretty blue and yellow flowers, but with us it lacks the bright 

 fresh green foliage which seems as necessary as the flowers 

 for an Iris. This may come on later, but at this season, just as 

 the flowers open, it makes a shabby appearance by the side of 

 a bed of /. cristata, planted at the same time. 



Allium madidum, from the Pacific coast, grows only about six 

 inches high and bears a small, close umbel of pretty light pink 

 flowers. It needs protection in winter. 



The Greek Valerian, Polemoniicm reptans, is a pretty plant 

 growing over a foot high in cultivation, with an abundance of 

 light blue flowers half an inch wide. It is easy of culture 

 and thrives in either sun or shade. 



Saxifraga Mertensiana is a small species from Oregon, six 

 to eight inches high, with a low cyme of small white flowers a 

 quarter of an inch wide. The little round, scalloped leaf is its 

 principal feature of interest. These are nearly an inch wide, 

 thick, and lie close to the ground. Our plants were protected 

 with a thin covering of leaves last winter. Whether this 

 would be necessary in any ordinary season or not we have yet 

 to learn. 



Smilacina stellata, one of the False Solomon's Seals, is a 

 plant of the Lily family, not uncommon on moist banks, with 

 short panicles of pretty white flowers and rich light green 

 leaves. It is also a pretty plant when in fruit, and might be 

 useful in bouquets at both the flowering and fruiting sea- 

 son. It likes moist, gravelly soil and should be planted in the 

 shade unless such a situation can be given it. 



The Arrow-leaved Violet (V. sagittata) is not generally 

 so large a plant as V. pedata or Bird's-foot Violet, but it grows 

 with it in similar situations and is a pretty species. The blue 

 flowers have a purplish tinge which is not usually seen in the 

 common V. cuculata. It likes a fine, loamy soil. 

 Southwick, Mass. F. H. Horsford. 



Notes on Shrubs. 

 T T is not an uncommon fault with the accounts of new flow- 

 -*■ ering or fruiting plants which dealers offer to the public, 

 that the descriptions are so rose-colored and alluring as to lead 

 the unsuspecting buyer to make many an expensive purchase 

 which he is almost certain to regret when he discovers that his 

 new acquisition is after all no better than some old kind which 

 he already possessed. Such experiences finally lead people to 

 become distrustful of all the laudatory descriptions in trade 

 catalogues. Rhododendron (Azalea) Vaseyi (figured in Gar- 

 den and Forest, vol. i, p. 377), from North Carolina, has, dur- 

 ing the last year or two, received a good share of praise from 

 all who have tried it, and in this case, at least, everything said 

 seems to be well deserved. Without any artificial protection, 

 and exposed to the sun and to all winds, it has not been injured 

 in the slightest degree at the Arnold Arboretum. It has with- 

 stood the test of a variety of winters, and in vigor and hardi- 

 ness has proved itself fully the equal of its more northern 

 congeners. With the exception of a few unsatisfactory and 

 half hardy precocious flowering foreign Rhododendrons whose 

 flower-buds rarely survive our winters, and of our native 

 Rhodora, R. Vaseyi is the earliest of the genus to bloom. In an 

 unsheltered situation the first flowers opened about May 15th 

 (three days earlier in 1889) and the finest development of 

 efflorescence was reached within a week. The interval be- 

 tween the opening of the first and fading of the last flowers in 

 any individual plant is ordinarily about two weeks, but some- 

 times several days longer. At fullest bloom the plants are 

 quite destitute of foliage, but the large, thin leaves appear 

 as the pretty pink corollas begin to fall. Seed is freely 



