174 



Garden and Forest. 



[June 6, iS 



with a delicate edible kernel, although the fleshy portion of 

 the fruit has a most disagreeable rancid flavor. The male 

 and female flowers are produced on separate trees, so that 

 it is necessary to plant specimens of the two sexes in 

 order to insure a crop of fruit, which is not produced until 

 the trees have attained a considerable size. The Ginkgo is 

 supposed to be a native of some part of northern China, 

 where it is frequently cultivated in 

 the neighborhood of temples and pala- 

 ces, but it is nowhere known in a wild 

 state. It has been cultivated in Japan, 

 where it is believed to have been intro- 

 duced, from time immemorial, and 

 where it is valued for its beauty as well 

 as for its nuts, which are highly es- 

 teemed by the Japanese. 



This tree was introduced into Europe 

 about 130 years ago, and it must be 

 nearly a century since it was first sent 

 to America. The peculiar shape of the 

 leaves has gained for it the name of the 

 Maidenhair tree, from their supposed 

 resemblance to the fronds of the Maiden- 

 hair Fern. It is a large tree, producing 

 valuable timber, sometimes attaining 

 in Japan a height of nearly 100 feet, 

 with a trunk three or four feet in diam- 

 eter. The Ginkgo, to which the name 

 Salisburia is sometimes improperly 

 given, is very hardy as far north, at 

 least, as New England, although a 

 milder climate seems necessary to 

 develop its greatest beauty. Consider- 

 able attention has lately been given 

 to the Ginkgo in Europe, as a subject 

 for street and road-side planting, and 

 thousands of these trees have been 

 planted during the last few years along 

 the highways near some of the French 

 and Italian towns of the Riviera. Its 

 hardiness and its habit of growth seem 

 to fit it admirably for this purpose. 



generally along avenues in France. A gentleman now resid- 

 ing on tlie Riviera, familiar with the Salisburia as a street tree 

 in Shanghai and other Chinese towns, has, at his own expense, 

 planted avenues of it in some of the small Italian towns near the 

 French frontier. If these succeed, and there seems no reason 

 to doubt it, the Ginkgo will probably become, popular through- 

 out southern France. 



Old Lombardy Poplar at the Trianon. — hi 

 the charming park of the Trianon where 

 Louis XIV. was wont to retire for a time — 

 when he was tired of the splendors of 

 Versailles — stand the remains of a fine old 

 Lombardy Poplar wliich was planted by 

 Marie Antoinette. The top of tlie tree 

 was blown off by a storm in 1880, but the 

 trunk is yet full of life, and has a cir- 

 cumference of seventeen feet six inches, 

 four feet from the ground. 



Sugar Maple. — A diligent search through 

 the park at the Trianon for trees, original 

 sp)ecimens introduced into France by 

 Michaux, was not successful. Since 

 Michaux's time there have been revolu- 

 tions and changes of Government, and 

 the authorities do not seem able to point 

 to many trees which can be said, with 

 certainty, to date back to Michaux himself. 

 One, however, a goodly sized Sugar 

 Maple, is probably an original tree, and 

 it was, by no means, in thoroughly good 

 order, as the Mistletoe had taken com- 

 plete possession of it. The branches 

 were weighted down with this parasite, 

 although the year before large quantities 

 had been carefully cut out. 



Ginkgo biloba. — A fine pair of these trees — perhaps better 

 known under the name of Salisburia adiantifoUa — stand in the 

 State nurseries at Trianon. They are a male and female, and 

 the latter was laden with fruits at the time of my visit last 

 autumn. The larger of the two had a trunk which measured 

 more than two and a half metres in circumference. It seems 

 strange that so handsome a tree has not been planted more 



Fi,o;. 32. — Camassia Cusickii. — See page 172. 



Actinidia volubilis. — Has any one grown this shrub in the 

 Lhiited States for the sake of its fruits ? A fine specimen, 

 trained to a stake, at the Chateau de Segrez, was, last autumn, 

 laden with roimd fruits, green in color and about the size of a 

 large hazel nut. The taste was decidedly agreeable, the flavor 

 not unlike that of some kinds of gooseberry. Probably the 

 best and most complete collection of hardy ligneous plants,. 



