126 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 33S. 



of the panicles or the delicate beauty of the individual 

 flower. 



As an ornamental plant, Chionanthus Virginica has one 

 serious fault. The leaves unfold so late in the season that 

 the plants are naked and appear dead at that time of the 

 year when other trees and shrubs are clothed in their ver- 

 nal green and many of them are covered with flowers. 

 The Fringe-tree is, therefore, difficult to group with other 

 shrubs without injuring during the early spring months the 

 appearance of the mass. This defect, however, great as it 

 is, is not without compensation, for the Fringe-tree pro- 

 duces its flowers at a time of the year when nearly all 

 other deciduous-leaved shrubs in our gardens have passed 

 their flowering period. 



The Chinese Fringe-tree, Chionanthus retusa, which 

 grows in the neighborhood of Peking, and has also been 

 found in several places in southern China and in Formosa, 

 appears a much less desirable ornamental plant than the 

 American species, although it possesses much scientific 

 interest from the points of view of geographical botany 

 and of the kinship of the eastern North American and east- 

 ern Asiatic floras. 



From the American plant Chionanthus retusa is distin- 

 guished by its smaller leaves, its smaller and shorter pan- 

 icles of flowers, with shorter and less conspicuous petals. 

 It was introduced into European gardens several years ago 

 by the Veitches, of London, who obtained it through their 

 collector, Maries; it has been an inhabitant of the Arnold 

 Arboretum since 1886, although it has not flowered there 

 yet. Two years ago a specimen was planted in the park 

 in Rochester, New York, and flowered this year at the end 

 of May, about a week earlier than the American species 

 in the same place opened its flowers. 



Our illustration, on page 327 of this issue, is made from 

 a branch of this plant, for which we are indebted to the 

 courtesy of Mr. Calvin C. Laney, superintendent and engi- 

 neer of the Rochester parks. 



Except in its earlier flowering, Chionanthus retusa has 

 little to recommend it as compared with the American 

 species. 



Plant Notes. 



Berteroa mutabilis. — This "Hardy Sweet Alyssum" is 

 a Levantine plant, which is more useful in wild gar- 

 dens or places where it can have much space to spread, 

 than in small gardens. It would be a good plant for large 

 rocky spaces in public parks where a bright, but quiet, effect 

 is desired. Grown in masses it makes an effective fore- 

 ground for bold-growing plants whose lower parts require 

 masking. It seeds too freely for small gardens, where 

 otherwise it would not be unattractive. It forms plants 

 about two feet or more across, somewhat less in height, 

 and numerous low-branching stems with many side-shoots 

 which produce terminal small clusters of white Alyssum- 

 like flowers. The leaves are small, lance-shape'd, and in- 

 conspicuous and slightly hoary. It is perfectly hardy 

 here. 



NvMPHiEA gracilis. — This seems t<> be the American rep- 

 resentative of the Stellata group of Water-lilies. It was 

 noted in one of the early numbers of Garden and Forest 

 (see vol. iii., p. 415) by Mr. Pringle, in one of his inimitable 

 letters describing the Nympha?as of Mexico. For its intro- 

 duction to cultivation we are indebted to Mr. E. D. Sturte- 

 vant. It is much valued by growers, as it is day-flowering, 

 and the white form is a fine addition to the tropical Nym- 

 pha?as. The flowers vary in color from light blue to white, 

 have sharp-pointed narrow petals, and are borne on stiff 

 stems well above the water. The leaves are light green, 

 dentated and large. The plant is very vigorous in growth. 



Gladiolus sulfureus. — This Gladiolus is now in bloom 

 and has flowers of striking beauty, though not brilliant. 

 The coloring at first is a greenish yellow, changing to a 

 very satisfactory shade of yellow of the Nankeen order. 

 Strong plants have stems two and a half feet high, "with 



two fairly compact rows of medium-sized flowers, of which 

 there are eighteen to twenty on a spike. Mr. Baker de- 

 scribes this species as having seven to eight flowers on a 

 very lax equilateral spike. The note was probably made 

 from a weak growth and would describe the plant as flow- 

 ered here last season. With greater vigor the spike is more 

 pleasing and well furnished. Its habitat is said to be 

 Mount Kilimanjaro, at an altitude of 5,000 feet. It has not 

 been tested for hardiness, so far as we are aware. There 

 is another Gladiolus sometimes sold and grown as G. sul- 

 fureus, but this is a light yellow form of G. tristris, a Cape 

 species. 



Tecoma grandiflora. — The wide-spreading bell-shaped 

 flowers of this climber are just beginning to open here, and 

 their color, which is a soft salmon-yellow without and a 

 light orange within the tube, ranging to orange-red, with 

 darker stripes on the outspread portion, are altogether more 

 rich and pure than those of our native Trumpet Creeper, 

 T radicans. We gave a figure of this plant in vol. iii., 

 p. 393, grown in a pot, and as it flowers when very small, 

 and more freely, too, when forced by artificial heat, it is a 

 good subject for forcing. Nevertheless, it never looks bet- 

 ter than when trained up a low pillar, when it throws out 

 its flowering branches in graceful curves. It is not so hardy 

 as our native Trumpet Creeper, but it will survive our win- 

 ters in any fairly sheltered position. When this Chinese 

 Tecoma and our native T. radicans are planted together, 

 the latter will commence to bloom in late June, while T. 

 grandiflora begins in early August and continues to flower 

 until it is checked by frost. 



Clematis Virginiana. — Just now there is no plant which 

 does so much to give a delicate beauty to shady thickets 

 along our roadsides as the common Virgin's Bower. Its 

 long stems support themselves wherever their petioles can 

 find an object to twist about, but by the time they bloom 

 they usually run over the tops of bushes in the most 

 graceful curves, and their starry flowers in large panicles 

 make these flowering stems objects of singular beauty. 

 The plant is beautiful, too, in late autumn, when the ripe 

 fruits appear in downy tufts, and yet there is something in 

 it which refuses to be civilized. It grows well in cultiva- 

 tion, but somehow it never seems to adapt itself graciously 

 to a well-ordered garden, and it never looks as well as it 

 does in remote parts of large grounds or when running 

 over wayside shrubberies. 



Cypripedium Charlesworthii. — Mr. Watson writes that 

 this Cypripedium is flowering in many collections in 

 England, and so far not a single plant has disappointed 

 its owner, every one being attractive in color and distinct. 

 At the same time some amount of variation in the form of 

 the flowers, particularly in the size of the dorsal sepal, as 

 well as in color, has been revealed. Certainly it is a good 

 garden plant, combining as it does a distinct character 

 of flower with good nature under cultivation. It is now 

 plentiful in English gardens. 



Cultural Department. 



Notes on Trees and Shrubs. 



THE names huckleberry, whortleberry and hurtleberry, 

 with qualifying or descriptive prefixes, are all often used 

 indiscriminately for the fruits ot two distinct genera of plants, 

 Gaylussacia and Vaccinium. Locally, however, the name of 

 Huckleberry is generally given to the former genus, while the 

 fruits of the species of Vaccinium are commonly called blue- 

 berries, although some of the species bear black fruits, while 

 on the other hand there are Gaylussaeias which produce blue 

 fruits. At one time they were both included under the genus 

 Vaccinium by botanists, but good generic characters were 

 found for separating them. 



The genus Gaylussacia differs from Vaccinium in having 

 leaves usually resinous dotted in the opening of the anthers 

 and most especially in the structure of the fruit. While a 

 Blueberry or Vaccinium fruit is only four or five celled (these 

 cells being sometimes partly ilivided by other in-growing par- 

 titions), and contains many small seeds, the fruit of the Huckle- 



