51 
imen in the Arboretum is in the nursery plantation near the top of 
Peter's Hill. Sorbus Koehneana has flowered and fruited in the Arbor- 
etum this year for the first time. It is a shrub now about three feet 
high with slender erect stems, small leaves with numerous narrow leaf- 
lets, small compact clusters of flowers, and snow-white fruit. It is a 
beautiful shrub which when 'better known will become common in gar- 
dens. The plants in the Arboretum were raised from seeds collected 
by William Purdom in northern Shensi. Sorbus pokuashanensis, so 
named because it was discovered on the Pohua Mountains in north- 
ern China, is also well established in the Arboretum. The leaflets are 
rather broader than those of the Rowan tree, but it has the red fruit 
and woolly buds of that species and is not superior to it for general 
cultivation. Although they are not as large and shapely trees as some 
of the Old World species, the two Mountain Ashes of eastern North 
America, Sorbus americana and its variety decora, have no rivals in 
this group in the beauty of the great drooping clusters of orange fruit 
and in the orange and red tints of their autumn foliage. They are 
small trees or large shrubs and are often planted in gardens in Can- 
ada, northern Michigan and Minnesota, but unfortunately are still little 
known in those of eastern Massachusetts. 
Sorbus alnifolia of the section Micromeles of the genus is perhaps 
the most satisfactory of the Mountain Ashes with entire leaves which 
can be grown here. It is a common Japanese tree and occurs also in 
Korea and northern and central China, and sometimes in its native 
countries grows to the height of sixty feet. Several specimens have 
been growing in the Arboretum since 1893 and are now from twenty 
to thirty feet tall. These trees are pyramidal in habit with pale smooth 
stems, upright branches which form a broad compact symmetrical 
pyramidal head, and dark green leaves three or four inches long, small 
white flowers in six- to twelve-flowered clusters, and abundant lustrous 
scarlet or scarlet and orange fruit which remains on the branches after 
the leaves and until eaten by birds which are fond of the fruit of all 
the species of Sorbus. The leaves turn bright clear yellow about the 
middle of October and soon fall. 
Mountain Ashes thrive only in well-drained rich soil and suffer from 
drought and insufficient nourishment. They are particularly liable to 
the attacks of the San Jose scale, and in order to secure healthy plants 
it is important to spray them late in March or early in April with lime- 
sulphur. 
The Spindle-tree or Burning Bush. By these names some of the 
species of Evonymus are popularly known. Evonymus is a genus of 
shrubs or small trees widely distributed over the temperate regions of 
the northern hemisphere and more abundant in species in eastern Asia 
than in North America or Europe. As a garden plant the species with 
deciduous leaves are chiefly valuable for their showy fruits, although 
the leaves of some of the Asiatic species become bright colored in 
the autumn. The flowers of all the species are inconspicuous. The 
fruit is a scarlet, red or whitish capsule, which when it opens displays 
