SPRING-FLOWERING TREES AND SHRUBS 183 



but this fact has only recently been made known. 

 This form, however, is rare in a wild state and that 

 most usually met has rosy or reddish-pink flowers. 

 This variety has likewise been long cultivated in 

 China and also in Japan, where it is known as Sarasa- 

 renge and in Japanese nursery catalogues as M. 

 obovata,v2LT. discolor; correctly, it should be M. denudata, 

 var. purpurascens. In 1900, I introduced this va- 

 riety by means of seeds collected from wild trees in 

 central China, but as yet the plants have not borne 

 flowers. However, I strongly suspect that it has 

 been cultivated in western gardens for a much longer 

 period, under some other name, and its identity 

 obscured. 



Both the white and colored varieties of the Yulan 

 are trees fifty feet tall, with a trunk eight feet in 

 girth, and have ascending and spreading branches. 

 Such trees I have seen in the forests of central China 

 laden with thousands of flowers, and the spectacle 

 they presented will never be forgotten. In western 

 gardens examples of the white variety from twenty to 

 twenty-five feet tall are known, and fine specimens 

 are common in the gardens of eastern North America 

 where the Yulan is a very popular tree. 



The second species to be introduced to our gardens 

 was the Purple-flowered Magnolia (usually known as 



