438 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 238. 



already prophesied along every road-side and in every 

 field. 



The mountains of the soutli-western portion of \'irginia, as 

 well as those farther south and west, are yearly becoming more 

 accessible to travelers, and their great charm and beauty are 

 sure, before long, to make the tide of spring and summer travel 

 turn in their direction. Away from the railroads, accommoda- 

 tions are scarce and usually of the most primitive description, 

 but beauty of scenery, superb views and the intense quiet of 

 the great forests make up to a degree for the lack of luxury. 



The mountaineers were invariably civil and hospitable, and 

 readily shared their simple fare with us. Even the suspicious 

 moonshiner would travel out of his way to show us a short cut. 

 Great was the interest shown in our strange employment, and 

 speculations were rife as to our reasons for wishing to carry 

 away the useless weeds which grew in such profusion along 

 the slopes of every hill. 

 New York. Anna Murray Vail. 



January, produced vigorous plants, which began to flower 

 in 1886, and have flowered profusely ever since. The 

 flowers are large and dark-colored, but not larger, or of a 

 deeper shade, than those of many cultivated Peach-trees. 

 The fruit is free-stoned, rather thick-skinned, with white 

 juicy flesh ; it has" a fair flavor and good size, as is shown 

 in the illustration on this page from a drawing made in the 

 Arboretum by Mr. Faxon. The fruit, however, is not re- 

 markable in quality, although rather better than the average, 

 nor is it remarkable in size, and the only peculiarity of this 

 variety which deserves attention is its great vigor and hardi- 

 ness. The flower-buds of the Peach-tree are often killed 

 in this latitude ; and in eastern New England the peach- 

 crop is very uncertain, the trees rarely producing more 

 than one crop of fruit in four or five years. But up to the 

 present time the flower-buds of this Chinese variety have 



■A Chinese Peach. 



New or Little-known Plants. 



A Chinese Peach. 



IN the autumn of 1879 Dr. Bretschneider, the distinguished 

 botanist and Chinese scholar, and at that time an attache 

 of the Russian Legation at Pekin, sent to the Arnold Arbo- 

 retum the seeds of a number of trees and shrubs gathered 

 on the mountains near the Chinese capital. Among them 

 was a package of peach-stones labeled "Cultivated Peach, 

 growing wild." These seeds, planted in the following 



never been known to suffer, and year after year the 

 branches are covered with flowers and abundant crops of 

 fruit. Here, then, perhaps, is a variety from which seed- 

 lings can be raised which will be as hardy as the parent, 

 and which, by careful selection, will produce in time fruit of 

 first-rate quality, or which can be used by the hybridizer 

 to give vigor and hardiness to a new race of exceptionally 

 hardy Peaches. The quality of the fruit is already good 

 enough to justify the effort to improve it ; and the trees in 

 the Arboretum offer to pomologists of cold climates the op- 



