WISTARIA, 



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against a sheltered wall. In Japan there are 

 supposed hybrids with pale lavender flowers, 

 suggesting a blend of the blue and white kinds. 

 The fruits of the Wistaria are like a large 

 blunt-shaped French bean, covered with soft 

 silky down, and filled with flat, hard seeds ; 

 they are not often produced in this country. 

 There are forms with double flowers in white 

 and dark purple, but they open so badly in our 

 climate as not to be worth growing, and a 

 variety with variegated leaves has nothing to 

 commend it. Plants often occur with flower 

 clusters longer than in the common kind — 

 possibly crosses with W. multijuga. This long- 1 



Though less handsome than the Chinese plant 

 1 it is not without value, being hardier in cold 

 districts and blooming about a month later. 

 The lilac-purple flowers come early in July in 

 bunches only half the size of chinensis, more 

 crowded and borne erect instead of drooping, 

 and more strongly fragrant. The plant is of 

 slender growth, not particular as to soil, and 

 contentwith lessspacethan theTree- Wistaria, 

 rarely exceeding 30 to 40 feet. As a wall- 

 plant, or rambling over a mass of tree-stumps, 

 its finer forms are well worth growing, and if 

 cut at all should be pruned long. Several va- 

 rieties are grown, including alba, with white 



WISTARIA UPON A WOODEN FENCE. 



flowered form of chinensis, known as macrobo- 

 trys, has flowers paler in colour and less thickly 

 set, in graceful drooping bunches up to 2 feet 

 in length. Of other kinds grown in the gar- 

 dens of Japan, but still unknown in this coun- 

 try, there are forms with small leaves and thin 

 twining stems bearing miniature clusters of 

 white or deep purple in July and August ; and 

 another late-flowered sort with semi-double 

 flowers of soft rosy-mauve colour, hairy buds, 

 and distinct leaves. 



The American Wistaria {W.frutescens). 

 — This, the only western species, is found in 

 moist valleys of rich soil in thesouthern United 

 States, and was introduced so long ago as 1724. 



flowers ; purpurea, in violet-purple ; albo-lila- 

 cina, with flowers of pale lilac ; Backhousiana, 

 in a shade of violet ; and magnijica, the best 

 form. This is more free and vigorous than the 

 parent, with clusters half erect, and flowers 

 distinguished by acentral blotch of pale yellow. 

 Syn. Wistaria speciosa. 



The Japanese Wistaria (W.japonica). — ■ 

 A plant now often classed in the allied group 

 of Milletia — Old World climbers hardly sepa- 

 rated from Wistaria by their harder seed-pods. 

 It is a rare plant, growing at Kew as a twining 

 shrub with pale green leaves of few leaflets and 

 clusters of white flowers about 6 inches long, 

 coming in July and August. 



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