1^76 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



Leaflets, on a winged rachis, nineteen to twenty-nine, very small, scarcely 

 exceeding ^ in. in length, serrate only near the apex. Fruit ^ in. in diameter 

 bright red. 



This pretty shrub,^ which is a native of Yunnan in China, was introduced at 

 Kew from Les Barres^ in 1905. (A. H.) 



PYRUS AUCUPARIA, Mountain Ash, Rowan 



jyrus Aucuparia, Gaertner, De Fruci. ii. 45, t. 87 (1791); Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. ii. 916 

 (1838) ; Ascherson and Graebner, Syn. Mitiekurop. Flora, vi. pt. 2, p. 86 (1906). 



Sorbus Aucuparia, Linnseus, Sp.Pl. 477 (1753); Willkomm, Forstliche Mora, 862 (1887); Mathieu, 

 Flore ForestHre, 181 (1897); Schneider, Laubhokkunde, i. 672 (1906). 



Aucuparia silvestris, Medicus, Gesch. Bot. 86 (1793). 



A tree, occasionally attaining 50 ft. in height. Bark thin, smooth, greyish, 

 becoming thicker, darker in colour, and fissured at the base of old trunks. Young 

 branchlets more or less tomentose at first, ultimately glabrescent. Leaves, about 

 6 in. long, unequally pinnate, with a grooved rachis, tufted with long hairs and 

 glandular at the insertion of the leaflets, elsewhere slightly pubescent; leaflets 

 eleven to fifteen, opposite, subsessile, about 2 in. long, lanceolate-oblong, unequal 

 at the base, acute at the apex, sharply serrate except near the base ; upper surface 

 dull green, glabrous ; lower surface pale, more or less pubescent. 



Flowers in large corymbose cymes, the axis and branches of which are more or 

 less tomentose ; calyx and pedicels pubescent ; petals white, equal in length or 

 shorter than the stamens ; styles usually three, tomentose at the base. Fruit 

 spherical or ellipsoid, f in. in diameter, smooth, usually red. 



The terminal buds ^ are large, ovoid-conic, and covered in greater part with dense 

 white tomentum ; the lateral buds are smaller, slightly flattened, and appressed. 

 The leaf- scars, visible in winter, are crescentic, five -dotted, and situated on 

 prominent pulvini. 



Varieties 



I. This species varies in the wild state, as regards the amount of pubescence ; 

 and two distinct varieties are recognised : — 



I. Va.r. glabrata, Wimmer and Grabowski, Fl. Schles. ii. i, p. 21 (182 1). 



Buds, branchlets, and leaves glabrous ; leaflets smaller than in the type. This 

 is the common form at high elevations in the mountains of central and south- 

 eastern Europe. 



' Cf. Hutchinson, in Bot. Mag. t. 8241 (1909), where it is figured under the name Sorbus Vilmorini, Schneider, iaBull. 

 Herb. Boissier, vi. 317 (1906). 



2 This was raised at Les Barres from seeds received from P^re Delavay in 1889, and was described as Cormus foHolosa, 

 Franchet, in Vilmorin, Frut. Vilmorinianum, 103 (1904); but is not, as was supposed, identical with Pyrus foliolosa, 

 Wallich. The latter does not appear to be in cultivation. 



' The stipules are described by Lubbock, vajourn. Linn. Sac. {Bot.) xxx. 492, 493 (1895). 



