THOUGHTS ON GARDENING 91 



ductions, the Lilium Henryi not the least in 

 beauty and interest. " In the spring of 1899 Sir 

 William Thiselton-Dyer of Kew was kind enough 

 to select a young man from the staff of the Royal 

 Gardens who possessed, as far as could be judged, 

 the necessary qualifications for undertaking a pro- 

 longed journey in certain districts of China. The 

 selection has proved a happy one, and the success of 

 the venture so much beyond expectation that I 

 have felt justified in despatching Mr. Wilson on 

 another trip to the Chinese-Tibetan frontier, some 

 thousand mUes farther inland than he has been 

 before. In order that Wilson might be fully 

 equipped for obtaining the best results from the 

 neighbourhood, he first visited Ichang in the 

 Yangtsze Valley, and the western Hupeh generally, 

 and is conversant with the most striking of the 

 trees and shrubs known to be in that district ; some 

 months were devoted to visiting Professor Sargent 

 in Boston, and in finding Dr. Henry, at that time 

 in the Chinese Customs service and stationed at 

 Sczemao in Yunnam, on the borders of Tonkin. 



" The necessity of consulting Dr. Henry, and 

 benefiting by his unrivalled knowledge of Chinese 

 trees and shrubs — a knowledge freely imparted to 

 Wilson — was so obvious that a year was devoted 



