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PAGODA TREE. 



Family: LEGUMINOSAE. 



Reproductive system: DECANDRY, MONOGYNY. 



The Japanese pagoda tree. Sophora japonica, LINN., is one of the most beautiful 

 trees acclimatized in France during the last century. The seeds were sent here by Father 

 d'Incarville in 1747 [Translator's note: Pierre d'lncarville, 1706-1757, Jesuit missionary 

 and botanist in China]. Thirty years later one of the trees bloomed in the garden of M. de 

 Noailles in Saint-Germain and another in the Trianon garden. Since that time the seeds 

 have been collected and the pagoda tree has spread throughout Europe. There's a fine one 

 in the Marbceuf garden and another in the King's Garden. But the most beautiful one 

 that's been grown from seeds collected in France is in the garden of M. de Montessuy at 

 Gros-Caillou. 



The trunk grows sixty or eighty feet high. The bark is gray on the trunk and dark 

 green on new branches. The leaves are pinnate and are composed of seven to eleven 

 smooth, pointed, entire, dark green oval leaflets. The flowers are white and form wide 

 open panicles at the ends of the branches. The calyx is a cup with five small teeth. The 

 corolla is papilionaceous, and there are ten stamens. The ovary is superior; it turns into an 

 oblong pod that looks like a string of beads and contains several seeds. 



FLOWERS: toward the end of spring. 



RANGE: China and Japan. 



NOMENCLATURE. Sophora, derived from its Arabic name sophera. After it had 

 been grown from seeds but before it bloomed it was known in France as the unknown tree 

 from China. 



USES, "litis tree is worth propagating in forests. 



