164 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Perhaps the feature by which this oak can be most readily 

 distinguished is its very shaggy bark, which peels off the stem and 

 hangs in longitudinal strips. Even in our young trees, of which 

 the eldest is, I should say, barely thirty years old, this characteristic 

 is already marked, and enables anyone to pick out bicolor from the 

 others formally set at regular distances on each side of a path merely 

 by glancing at the trunks. Besides the type I have two plants of 

 12 and 10 ft. high respectively, which are labelled Q. bicolor var., 

 but the varietal name, if it ever existed, has disappeared. 



Q. bicolor X alba. — We have two young plants 6 and 5 ft. high 

 of this interesting hybrid, which were given me five or six years ago, 

 I believe, by my good friend Professor Sargent of the Arnold 

 Arboretum, to whom also I am indebted for some of the rare and 

 recently discovered Chinese oaks, which will be referred to later. So 

 far this hybrid seems to be quite happy in its English quarters, but 

 it is too young for me to have any assurance as to its future. 



Q. castaneaejolia (C. A. Meyer). — This tree, whose home is in Persia, 

 the Caucasus, and Algeria, has grown very well, and forms here a 

 shapely plant 22 ft. in height with a girth of 1 ft. 6 in. at 3 ft. above 

 ground level. This specimen is not recorded by Elwes and Henry, 

 though they mention a good many of the Aldenham oaks. I presume 

 that it is not sufficiently rare in cultivation to make a plant, so small 

 as it then was, worthy of record. It is, however, seldom to be found 

 in British collections. The excellent photograph (fig. 16) for which it 

 sat, or rather stood, to Mr. Malby shows that it is now (191 9) one of 

 our. pronounced successes in the way of oak cultivation. My next best 

 specimen is of exactly the same height, 22 ft., but girths an inch less 

 in the stem. Its long and rather narrow leaves, recalling the tree 

 from which it takes its specific name, make it easily recognizable. 

 It has proved perfectly hardy, and indeed I may say the same of almost 

 every deciduous oak mentioned as growing here. There is not one 

 which we have had for any time that I can name as having suffered 

 damage from cold even in the severest winters, though some few 

 may have been killed by this cause while still infants in the nursery, 

 and others may have been a little damaged by late spring frost. 

 When it is remembered that in February of this year we registered 

 1° below zero in the screen, it can hardly be said that they have not 

 been thoroughly tested. 



Q. Catesbaei (Michaux). — This small deciduous oak is named after 

 Mark Catesby, author of the " Natural History of Carolina," and is a 

 native of North Carolina southwards to Florida and Eastern Louisiana. 

 It usually attains 20 to 30 ft. in height, but occasionally 50 to 60 ft. 

 The trunk rarely exceeds 2 ft. in diameter. The winter buds are 

 } in. long, pointed, and coated, especially towards the point, with 

 rusty pubescence. The leaves on the cultivated plant at Kew are 

 5 to 7 in. long by 3 to 5 in. wide, and are very deeply lobed, after the 

 fashion of the red oaks, having 2 to 4 deep lobes reaching two-thirds or 

 more of the way to the midrib. When fully grown the leaves are thick. 



