ORNAMENTAL TREES AND SHRUBS AT C A STLE WE LL A N . 413 



ABIES MABIESIL— From Japan in 1879. My plants are too small 

 to have shown their character yet. 



PINUS TH U NBEB GIL — A fast-growing Pine of stately propor- 

 tions. It is the tree chiefly used by Japanese gardeners for topiary work. 



ILEX LA TI FOLIA . — From Japan in 1810. It has large light green 

 serrated ovate leaves. A handsome shrub, more like a Laurel than a 

 Holly. I have had it out about twenty years. 



STYE AX JAPONIC UM. — A small tree bearing in autumn sweet- 

 scented white flowers with yellow stamens ; the flowers, being borne under- 

 neath the branches, are completely hidden from the view. 



OSMANTHUS ILICIFOLIA, 0. AUBEA and ABGENTEA, 0. 

 M YB TIFOLIA , 0. PUBPUBE 'A. —All, with pretty serrated leaves 

 and small sweet-scented flowers, are quite worth growing. I have one 

 five feet high and thirty feet round ; a dense mass shaped exactly like a 

 plum-pudding. 



HAMAMELIS ABBOBEA.—A deciduous Japanese shrub of 

 spreading habit ; grows about five feet high. It flowers in January. The 

 flowers are of a curious shape, with yellow petals and claret-coloured stamens. 



OLE A FBAGBANS. — A pretty bushy shrub of compact growth 

 with yellowish-white flowers borne in July. 



ACAXTHOPANAX BICINIFOLIUM.—k very distinct small tree 

 from Japan, introduced 1881, with heart-shaped leaves and prickly stems ; 

 grows fourteen feet high. 



I have grown the above forty-eight plants from Japan for many years 

 in my garden without any protection whatever, and I think it would be 

 difficult to surpass them by those from any other single country, either 

 for their interest or their beauty. 



Next to Japan I think we get more good things from Australia than 

 from anywhere else ; all of the following forty-nine plants from that 

 country grow with me with singular luxuriance, and it is a great advan- 

 tage that they are nearly all evergreen, as owing to our abominable custom 

 of going to London in the summer we are never in our gardens in the 

 most enjoyable season of the year, when the plants are at their best, but 

 see most of them in the winter. 



First, both for number and beauty, come the Pittosporums. I grow 

 twenty varieties, all perfectly hardy except 



P. EUGENIOIDES.—k fine plant of this, ten feet high, was killed to 

 the ground in the long frost of 1895. 



The names are P. Buchanani, P. Colensoi, P. coriaceum,P.crassifolium, 

 P. erioloma, P. eugenioides, P. e. variegatum, P. floribundum, P. lucidum, 

 P. tenuifolium, P. macrophyllum variegatum, P. Mayi, P. nigrescens, P. 

 phillyrceoides, P. Balphii, P. rhombifolium, P. rigidum, P. Tobira 

 variegatum, P. undulatum. Of these P. Colensoi is by far the most 

 beautiful, both from its colour and its graceful habit. It sometimes loses 

 a few inches of its topmost growths from severe frost, but it should be 

 pruned over just before the spring, which improves it and keeps it dense. 

 It is curious how little these Pittosporums are known or grown. We 

 were honoured by a visit a couple of years ago from eighty members of 



