376 



Garden and Forest. 



[October .;, 1888. 



intermediate teiiiperatuie, planted vui. in tree .soil in a h.ing, 

 narrow, span-roofed house. 



Dahlias have made their first appearance at the meet- 

 ings, and for the next two months we shall be surfeited 

 with novelties among them. To-day there were many 

 new sorts put before the committee, but ver}' few were 

 considered good enough for a certificate, fn my estima- 

 tion the finest sort, and one that will prove of most value 

 in the garden because of its distinct color, is one called 

 Heauty of Brentwood. It belongs to the so-called Cactus 

 Dahlias, and has flowers of the same size and shape as 

 /). /uaiesii, but the color, instead of scarlet, is a beautiful 

 shade of carmine, or perhaps some \vould say, carmine- 

 magenta. It is certainly a most telling flower, and one 

 that will make its mark. It received a unanimous vote. 

 Two single Dahlias from Messrs. Cheal, of Crawley, won 

 certificates. One was Victoria, with white florets edged 

 broadly with deep red, the other with broad flat florets of a 

 pale pink edged with buff — a most strange combination of 

 colors, hence its value as a break ; but as it only won 

 a certificate by a majority of two ^'otes, you may glean 

 that it did not please every one. 



The pretty little white Cavipanula isophvlla alba was 

 awarded a certificate. It is not a novelty, but was par- 

 ticularly well grown and flowered. It is a beautiful plant 

 for a suspended pot in a green-house or window, but is not 

 (|uite hardy in England in the open air. 



Mr. B. S. Williams made a fine displa)'' of Orchids in 

 flower, and one was singled out for a certificate. This 

 was the rather rare Odonioglossiim Karwiiiskii. It has a 

 long flower spike, dull-colored sepals and petals, and a 

 broad labellum colored with various shades of reddish 

 purple, but it is not what one would call an attractive 

 (Jrchid. Mr. Williams' group was rich in Orchids that flower 

 at this season, the rarest among them being Cypripedium 

 SanderianiDii, C. porphyreuvi iessellaluin, C. Ashbiir/o/ihr, 

 \'ar. supeibuiii (new and beautiful), C. AsliburtoiiicF expan- 

 siim, Caltkya aurca, Pachyslo7na Thompsoiilaiiiim (a great 

 rarity and very pretty), riz/Z/ri'i? Eldorado alba and spleiidens, 

 (ypi'ipediu)n aiianthiun si/perbuiii, Dendrobiuvi Goldici, all 

 of which are worth making a note of as being among the 

 finest of the comparatively few Orchids that flower in the 

 latter half of August. lAvo new Maiderdiair Ferns were 

 shown also by Mr. Williams. One was Adiantuiii 

 cnlpodes roseuiii. which has its young fronils of a ccipper\- 

 red hue, the other a crested fronded variety of A. 

 ("apillus-Vfueris named A. Versadknse, t^ crested, parsle}-- 

 like Fern. This was awarded a certificate, but the vote 

 was not unanimous. One of the several new varieties 

 of Delphinium shown by Messrs. Kelway won a certifi- 

 cate. It is called Horus, and has a massive spike of large 

 flowers, deep indigo blue, centered \\\\\\ white. 



i.on.i,,,,, Atis.ist24(ii ]Y, (uddriiity. 



A 



New or Little Known Plants. 



Rhododendron (Azalea) \''asevi. 



MONO the additions which have lieen made of late 

 years to the Flora of the United States, few plants 

 have a greater scientific and horticultural interest than the 

 beautiful Rhododendron figured upon page 377 of the 

 present issue of this journal. Its nearest American ally is 

 the Rhodora. In eastern Asia, however, there are t\vo or 

 three species of Rhododendron, with the campanulate, 

 irregularly bilabiate corolla which characterizes Rhodora 

 and this species, which is very like the sidi-alpine 

 Japanese, R. Albreclili. T!ie discovery, therefore, of R. 

 J'aseyr added, as Professor (iray at once pointed oul, 

 " another to the now very numerous cases of remarkable re- 

 lationship bet«'een the China-Ja]ianese and the Alleghanian 

 floras." Rhododendron Iv/sey/ has been so fully described, 

 that it is only necessar)' to add to Rrofessor Gray's and 

 Mr. J. Donnell Smitlis remarks * upon this plant that Mr. 



^ Rhododendrim Vaacyi, A.Vjvd\, I'roc. Am, Aaid., \\. 48; Bot. Ct.fffe, \iii. 2S2. 

 —John Donnell Smilh, Rn/I. Tcyriy Put. Club. .\\., 164 



Fa.\on, from whose drawing our illustration is made, notices 

 that the upper or posterior lobe of the corolla is exterior in 

 the expanded flower, a peculiarity we have been unable 

 to detect in the flowers of any other Rhododendron. 



7?. Vascyi is a tall shrub with slender branches, fifteen 

 to eighteen feet high, M'ith bright, clear pink, precocious 

 flowers, marked towards the base of the upper lobes of the 

 corolla with numerous darker spots. They are quite un- 

 like in color, and appear much earlier than those of other 

 American Azaleas. R. Vaseyi was discovered by I\Ir. 

 George R. Vasey, in 1878, near Webster, in Jackson 

 County, North Corolina ; it was afterward found in Cash- 

 ier's X'alley, South Carolina, directly in the rear of 

 the house long occupied, during the summer months, 

 by the Hampton family, where it grows in great lux- 

 uriance with A', arborescais, occupying the low banks of 

 a small stream : and during the present season it has been 

 found again, this time b)' i\Ir. S. T. Kelsey, upon Grand- 

 father Mountain, in North Carolina, only two or three 

 miles from Louisville, "growing everywhere in clumps 

 and patches on the southern and south-eastern slopes, at 

 4,500 to 5,000 feet elevation, but most abundant and vig- 

 orous in moist situations, and is associated with R. niaxi- 

 nunn, R. Cataivbiense and Kalmia latifolia.'' R. Vaseyi 

 takes readily to cultivation, flowering freely when not 

 more than a foot high, and promises to be perfectl)' hardy 

 in the climate of Boston. C. S. S. 



Koelreriteria bipinnata. 



MONSIEUR FRANCHP;T contributes an interesting ac- 

 count, accompanied with an illustration of the new 

 Koelieuteria uf western China, to a recent issue of the 

 Reviic Horlicole. It is one of the most important, from a 

 horticultural point of view, of the numerous discoveries 

 of the French missionary, Delavay, who alone, and remote 

 from all Europeans, has been able in the short space of 

 four years to double the number of Asiatic species of cer- 

 tain genera. The field of his observations is a very limited 

 one, not many square miles in extent, yet he has detected 

 in this small region of the mountains of Yunnam no less 

 than thirt3Mwo new Rhododendrons, and as man)' new 

 Primroses and Gentians. 



Kivhcuteria panicu/afa is a well known, small, orna- 

 mental tree irom northern Cliina, with large compound 

 leaves, cmisisting of from six to ten pairs of leaflets and 

 large panicles of yellow flowers, which appear in Jul)'. 

 ' ■ The new Krelreuteria,'' Monsieur Franchet points out, • ' is 

 entirely distinct, as may be judged from the following 

 description : 



" Kwlrei/le/ia bipinnata, Franch., Bull, de la Soc. Bot. de 

 France, xxxiii., 436, /. 93 A very vigorous tree, sixty feet 

 high ; leaves twenty-six inches long by twenty-four inches 

 broad at the base, doubly pinnate : pinna" coriaceous, 

 alternate, distinctly pediceled, nearly glabrous, dark green 

 above, pale on the lower surface, oval-lanceolate, sharply 

 serrate. The flowers resemble those of A', paiiiciilaia ; they 

 are bright yellow in color, the narrov/ed base of the petals 

 purple, and are produced in enormous, compact panicles. 

 The capsules are broadly oval, always obtuse, sometimes 

 nearly round, two and a half inches long, turning purple 

 when fullv ripe, 'i'he seeds are black, the size of a small 



"A, bipnrna/a, grows in the forest of Ta-ling-tin, above 

 Tapin-tza, in central \'unnam, at an elevation of more than 

 5,000 feet. It flowers at the end of July, and the fruit is 

 ripe in the autumn. 



"It is a remarkable tree on account of the size of its 

 leaves and the abundance of its flowers. In the autumn 

 its appearance is unique with its immense panicles of large 

 purple pods. It is ]3robable that this new species will 

 grow in cultivation as freely as its relative, but the experi- 

 ment has not been tried yet. The seed germinates freely, 

 and the young plants grow rapidly. Even if the climate of 

 Paris should pro\'e too se\ ere for this tree, it will no 



