ii4 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 317. 



bearing three to five flowers, each four inches across, in 

 form resembling some of the varieties of Lailia elegans ; 

 the sepals and petals creamy-white, tinged with rose, and 

 a few dots of crimson ; lip three-lobed, the lateral lobes 

 convolute, white tinged with purple, the front lobe an inch 

 and a half wide, broadly ovate, crisped and wavy, the apex 

 recurved and colored rich amethyst-purple. The hybrid 

 origin of the plant is purely conjectural. 



Stauropsis gigantea. — I have a twelve-flowered raceme 

 of this stately Orchid before me as I write, which I recently 

 received from a collection where this and many other 

 somewhat old-fashioned Orchids receive exceptional atten- 

 tion, and are grown with conspicuous success. It is 

 forty-five years since this Orchid was first flowered in 

 England by Mr. Robert Warner, when the plant was known 

 as Vanda gigantea, and although it has been discarded by 

 many in favor of more recent introductions, it is still emi- 

 nently worthy of a place in every large collection of trop- 

 ical Orchids. I know a plant a yard high clothed to the 

 base with two series of strap-shaped leathery leaves two feet 

 long, which bears every year a raceme of flowers, each 

 flower two inches across, the segments tongue-shaped, 

 fleshy, creamy-yellow, with pale red blotches, the lip and 

 column comparatively small and inconspicuous. These 

 flowers remain fresh several weeks. 



Narcissus Broussonetii. — This is one of the rarest and 

 most interesting of the species of Narcissus. It is scarcely 

 known in English gardens, but I remember reading some- 

 where that it is successfully cultivated in pots in the United 

 States, and is much appreciated there. A few years ago it 

 was re-introduced to Kew after having been lost to culti- 

 vation many years. It flowered, and a figure of it was pub- 

 lished in the Botanical Magazine, the plants dying soon 

 afterward. Recently a quantity of bulbs of it have again 

 been obtained from Morocco, where it is a native, and 

 another attempt will be made to establish it here. Mean- 

 while, any information as to its cultural requirements will 

 be welcome. It has long narrow glaucous green leaves, 

 peduncles a foot long, two-edged, bearing umbels of pure 

 white flowers, each over an inch across and remarkable in 

 having the corona almost entirely suppressed. The flowers 

 are fragrant. 



Salvia macrostachya is a handsome species, which has 

 long been known to botanists as a common plant in South 

 America, but has never been introduced into cultivation till 

 now. Seeds of it were sent to Kew last year from Quito, 

 and the plants raised were grown outside till autumn, when 

 they were lifted and potted. They are now five feet high, 

 with four-angled stems and large cordate green leaves, 

 eight inches by seven inches, the petioles four inches long. 

 The flowers are in large terminal spikes six inches long by 

 three inches in width, the bracts ovate, over an inch long, 

 green, and the flowers an inch and a half long, bilabiate, and 

 colored lilac-blue. The whole plant is covered with fine 

 silky hairs. As a spring-flowering plant for the conserva- 

 tory this is likely to prove a useful Salvia. A figure of it 

 has been prepared for publication in the Botanical Magazine. 



Saxifraga Burseriana. — There is no more charming alpine 

 plant than this when it is grown in pots in a frame and 

 brought into the cool-house in February to flower. In the 

 alpine-house at Kew (which is an unheated span-roofed 

 structure about fifty feet long, with a trellis stage on each 

 side of a central path) there are now many pots of this be- 

 side numerous other species of Saxifraga, but S. Burseriana 

 is far the best of them all. Cushions of gray-green six 

 inches across, thickly studded all over with short-stalked 

 pure white flowers as large as primroses, which last a fort- 

 night or three weeks. No plants are more easily managed ; 

 little tufts are potted in spring, after the flowers are over, 

 in loamy soil, and pieces of sandstone are placed over the 

 surface of the soil. To these the Saxifrage clings, and in a 

 year or two the whole surface is a conical tuft of gray- 

 green, pretty enough even when not in flower, but a gem 

 among greenhouse plants in February and March, 



Trial of New Plants. — I perceive that there is some 

 slight difference between the work done by your experi- 

 mental stations and that performed by the Royal Horticul- 

 tural Society at Chiswick, the only place in England where 

 systematically conducted trials of new garden flowers, 

 fruits and vegetables are publicly conducted for the public 

 good. This year the subjects to which attention will be 

 devoted are the following : The committees which adjudi- 

 cate at the bimonthly exhibitions of plants are summoned 

 to meet at Chiswick whenever any group of plants under 

 trial are ready to be examined. The results of the trials 

 are reported in the journal of the Society and in the gar- 

 dening papers. Invitations are sent out to nurserymen 

 and others interested, who are requested to send to Chis- 

 wick examples of any plants to be tried. These are care- 

 fully cultivated by a staff of gardeners under the direction 

 of Mr. A. F. Barron, the superintendent. From the fact 

 that the trials are open to the inspection of the public the 

 merits of new flowers, etc., are not likely to be overlooked, 

 nor on the other hand can inferior novelties escape detection 

 under such a trial. The following is the official programme : 

 The council of the Royal Horticultural Society has decided 

 to make trials this season of the following subjects in the 

 gardens at Chiswick : (1) By the Floral Committee: Can- 

 nas, Clematis, bedding Begonias, tree (perpetual or winter- 

 flowering) Carnations, zonal Pelargoniums for pots, Cam- 

 panulas and Sweet Peas. (2) By the Fruit and Vegetable 

 Committee : Strawberries (all sorts), Cauliflowers, new varie- 

 ties Tomatoes, newvarieties Potatoes and new varieties Peas. 

 Growers and others interested in these plants, seeds, etc., 

 are hereby invited to contribute examples for this purpose, 

 and to be good enough to forward the same to the Super- 

 intendent, Royal Horticultural Society Gardens, Chiswick, 

 as early as may be convenient. Full particulars may be 

 obtained on application to the Secretary, the Rev. W. Wilks, 

 Royal Horticultural Society, 1 17 Victoria Street, S. W. 



London. 



W. Watson. 



New or Little-known Plants. 



Ostrya Knowltoni, a new Species of Hop Hornbeam. 



THE Hop Hornbeam of the eastern United States, 

 Ostrya Virginiana (Mill), Willd., occurs from the 

 Atlantic states westward to the Mississippi Valley, and 

 reaches the south-western limit of its range in the eastern 

 portions of Nebraska, Kansas, Indian Territory and Texas. 

 The discovery of a second species of this genus in the 

 United States will be of interest -to all American botanists, 

 and the fact of its geographic separation from Ostrya Vir- 

 giniana by a distance of nearly a thousand miles gives this 

 discovery additional interest. In the year 1889 Mr. Frank 

 H. Knowlton was occupied in making a collection of the 

 plants of San Francisco Mountain, in northern Arizona, and 

 spent a portion of his time in a side trip to the Grand Canon 

 of the Colorado. Mr. Knowlton was in the company of a 

 party engaged in a biological survey of the San Francisco 

 Mountain region under the direction of Dr. C. Hart Mer- 

 riam. The party reached the Grand Canon at a point 

 known as Canon Spring, having traversed the road from 

 San Francisco Mountain by the way of Hull Spring and 

 Red Horse Spring. The southern wall of the Grand Canon 

 at this point is about 1,800 metres in height, and the trail, 

 which leads circuitously from its summit to the river be- 

 low, is about ten kilometres in length. This long steep 

 slope is cut up by deep lateral canons, on the cool northern 

 slopes of which, in their higher altitudes, grow the Rocky 

 Mountain Yellow Pine, Pinus ponderosa Scopulorum ; the 

 Douglas Spruce, Pseudotsuga taxifolia, and the Rocky 

 Mountain Fir, Abies concolor. On slopes of southern ex- 

 posure, and even on northern slopes at lower altitudes, is a 

 o-rowth of small forest-vegetation characteristic of the 

 Upper Sonoran zone of the desert, made up of the Nut 

 Pine, Pinus edulis ; the Desert Juniper, Juniperus Califor- 

 nica Utahensis, and the Mountain Mahogany, Cercocarpus 



