i6o4 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



ward to Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi. It grows on rich wooded slopes and 

 river banks, attaining its largest size in the forests on the western slopes of the 

 southern Alleghany Mountains, where it sends up tall straight trunks, sometimes 

 3 ft. in diameter and 50 to 60 ft. high. 



Sargent says that the wood is light, soft, and close-grained, of a light-brown 

 colour, but it does not seem to have any special use or value in America, and is not 

 mentioned in Hough's American Woods. 



This species, or the form H. stenocarpa, was introduced in 1756, when John 

 Ellis raised plants from seeds sent from America by Dr. Alex. Graham. The plant 

 figured as H. tetraptera by Sims, Bot. Mag. t. 910 (1805), shows the petals deeply 

 divided to the base, and is H, stenoptera ; and all the old trees that we have seen 

 are of this form. 



Though one of the most ornamental flowering deciduous trees that we have, 

 the Snowdrop tree has never become common in cultivation, and like many old 

 favourites has been neglected for the numerous new introductions from China and 

 Japan. Though usually seen rather as a shrub than a tree, it has in a few places 

 attained such large dimensions that it may rank with Arbutus, Laburnum, and 

 Magnolia among trees of the third rank in size, but of the first in beauty. It seems 

 to thrive best in a warm sandy loam, free from lime ; to require a long and warm 

 summer to ripen its wood properly ; and to be proof against the most severe frosts 

 when well established in the south and east of England. It ripens seeds in warm 

 summers only, but I have not succeeded in raising plants from English-grown seeds. 



Loudon records the finest trees known to him at Purser's Cross and Syon, 

 30 ft. high and 4 to 4^ ft. in girth, but these seem to be no longer living. The 

 tallest that we have seen is in an outlying part of the woods at Pains Hill, 

 where a tree, forked at the base and almost prostrate, is 48 ft. from the root to the 

 top. The two stems were 3 ft. 6 in. and 3 ft, 2 in. in girth ; and the tree was 

 bearing fruit when I saw it in 1908. 



Another very large tree grows in the grounds of Mr. Boardman, Town Close 

 House, Norwich, and when figured by Grigor in 1841 was 29 ft. high and 4 ft. in 

 girth, with a circumference of t^^ yards. When I saw it in 1908 it was 32 ft. by 

 6 ft. 3 in., forking at about 4 ft. from the ground ; and one of the limbs was 4^ ft. 

 in girth. Its fruit was nearly ripe in October. There is a handsome tree at 

 Leonardslee, about 25 ft. by 2 ft., with a clean stem 15 ft. long. There is a fine 

 specimen in Colonel Buncombe's grounds at Waresley Park, Herts, which is about 

 35 ft. high by \\ ft. in girth. Mr. Wyndham Fitzherbert reports^ a tree in a 

 garden at Kidderminster, 28 ft. in height and 5 ft. in girth, with a spread of branch 

 of 48 ft. He states that some small trees planted in decomposed peat made 

 astonishing growth, attaining 20 feet in height in twelve years. At Milford 

 Lodge, Craven Arms, there is a fine tree about 30 ft. in height. 



We have seen no specimens in Scotland or Ireland. (H. J. E.) 



^ Gardening Illustrated, 19th November 1910. 



