67 
until December. This is one of the handsomest of the shrubs in the 
Arboretum which retain their foliage without change of color until 
the beginning of winter. Such plants are valuable in the autumn gar- 
den to contrast with plants of brilliant autumn coloring. Another valu- 
able plant for this purpose is Magnolia glauca, the Sweet Bay of the 
Atlantic and Gulf Coast regions from Massachusetts to Texas. This 
Magnolia is still covered with its bright green shining leaves which 
are silvery white on the lower surface and these will not fall for at 
least another month. Attention has often been called in these Bulletins 
to the value of this tree in New England gardens. Few deciduous- 
leaved trees have more beautiful and more persistent foliage; the cup- 
shaped, creamy white flowers continue to open during at least two 
months in early summer and All the air with their fragrance, and the 
fruit, like that of all the Magnolias, is interesting and handsome when 
the bright red seeds hang from it on slender threads. 
Roadside Plants. Much attention has been paid here for several years 
in experimenting to secure the best plants to occupy the narrow beds 
between the driveways and the gravel paths which follow them, and 
thus far the most satisfactory plant found for this purpose has been 
Rosa virginiana, often called R. lucida, the seashore Rose of New 
England, an upright shrub from two to three feet in height which is 
still covered with its leaves lustrous in the early season and turning 
yellow late in October. A plant which came here many years ago from 
the island of Mt. Desert on the coast of Maine, and now distinguished 
as var. lamprophylla, is a handsomer plant than the typical form, of 
denser habit and with darker green lustrous leaves. The large pink 
flowers and the showy red hips are similar to those of the common 
form. The other plants which have been most successsully used for 
this purpose are the Fragrant Sumach {Rhus canadensis) and Xantho- 
rhiza apiifolia. The Fragrant Sumach is a widely distributed North 
American shrub which rarely grows more than five feet tall, and when 
planted in good soil is often broader than high with lower branches 
spreading flat on the ground and upper branches erect, spreading or 
drooping. In early spring before the leaves appear the branches are 
covered with clusters of small bright yellow flowers which in June are 
followed by dull red fruits which are much hidden by the small com- 
pound leaves. Among the small shrubs in the Arboretum few are more 
brilliant at this season of the year for the leaves turn gradually to 
bright scarlet and orange. The Xanthorhiza has also been largely and 
successfully used here; it makes a neat border plant and is also well 
suited to grow under shrubs or trees. This low shrub spreads rapidly 
by underground stems which do not grow more than twelve to eighteen 
inches high. The small purple flowers, which are arranged in drooping 
clusters, appear as the leaves unfold; these are pinnate, of a cheerful 
green color, and turn late in the autumn pale yellow, orange or occa- 
sionally scarlet. 
Some dwarf broad-leaved evergreens. The color which the leaves of 
a few of these assume in* the autumn add greatly to the interest of 
these plants in November. The most conspicuous change of color on 
any of those in the Arboretum is on the Rocky Mountain Mahonia or 
