THE NEW FORSYTH I A 
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end to end by botanists for generations 
past, a new shrub should still be brought 
to light, and that belonging to a group 
hitherto confined to the far East. But 
this is explained by the fact that its home 
is Albania, a part of the Balkan penin- 
sula which has remained the most diffi- 
cult and dangerous of any region of 
Europe. In October 1899 Herr Froebel 
of Zurich received from Dr von Degen 
of Budapest a little of the seed collected 
by him in Albania, and from this seed 
was able to raise a number of plants. 
The seedlings did well and in the autumn 
of 1902 were fine shrubs of 6 feet. In 
the following spring, under the impres- 
sion that the plants were showing leaf- 
buds only, they were transplanted with 
the hope of inducing flower, and after 
this one plant flowered immediately on 
the old wood, though with only a few 
scattered blooms. Their appearance 
made possible a complete description 
of the plant, given as follows : — 
A shrub of medium height, with 
numerous opposite upright or slightly 
curving branches, the younger some- 
what angular, the older almost round. 
The bark is thin, yellow-brown, wrinkl- 
ed, and hairless. The leaves, in whorls 
of 2 to 4, are stout, rather leathery, and 
of two shapes, some being large, oval, 
long-pointed, and gradually tapering 
towards the stem, the others small, oval, 
and almost stemless. All are alike entire 
at the edge, smooth above and below, 
with the underside of a paler green. 
The blooms come before the leaves and 
are solitary, or two or three together. 
The buds arefolded withinbrown scales, 
and the flower-stalks are rounded and 
I hairless. The calix is composed of four 
oval-lanceolate segments, which are 
fringed at the edges , and brown in colour 
shading to purple at the tips, the whole 
remaining as a part of the seed-vessel. 
These vessels are of similar shape and 
almost woody in texture, ending in a 
short beak, and divided into three com- 
partments containing 4 or 5 long- 
shaped, almost triangular brown seeds, 
which are compressed at the sides and 
slightly winged. The leaves vary from 
less than two to nearly three inches in 
length, including the stalk, and the 
flower-stems are either about the same 
or a little less long. 
The new shrub differs from Forsyt/iia 
suspe?isa mt\\Q stout, somewhat leathery 
leaf,whichis narrower and more pointed, 
; neither lobed nor indented, and tapers 
more decidedly towards the stalk. The 
leaf- stalks also are shorter, and the seed- 
1 vessels longer in the beak. From For- 
syth ia viridisshna it differs in the leaf 
I being smaller by one half, untoothed, 
i stouter and more leathery in texture, 
and also in the shape of the seed-vessel. 
The same features distinguish it from 
I F. i7iter media (siispensa x viridissimd) , 
and from F. Fo7^tunei and F. Sieboldi of 
gardens, in fact the plant is so distinct 
in the form and texture of its leaves as 
I to be quite unlike any previously known 
I kind. It is found freely in hedges and 
j as spreading clumps throughout the 
I Orosi district of Albania, near Simoni 
I and Kalyvaria. 
So surprising is the discovery of this 
Forsythia that it has been urged that it 
must be a strayed form of the Chinese 
plant, but the following facts point to 
