is an inhabitant of the river banks of the Mississippi Valley from Illinois 
to Kansas and Texas and sometimes grows to a great size. This species 
bears very large leaves which are dark green and dull on the upper sur- 
face and ashy gray on the lower surface and, like the young shoots, are 
clothed when they unfold with a thick, felt-like gray covering. Some of 
the other species in the collection which should be studied by persons in- 
terested in handsome vines are Vitis vulpina, the Frost Grape, the species 
which grows the furthest north; Vitis rotundifolia, the Muscadine or 
Southern Fox Grape, often cultivated in selected forms in the southern 
states as the Scuppernong Grape; Vitis monticola, the Sweet Mountain 
Grape of the limestone hills of southwestern Texas; Vitis rubra or pal- 
mata, a slender graceful plant found from Illinois to Missouri, Louisiana 
and Texas; Vitis arizonica, with small, pale gray-green leaves; Vitis 
aestivalis , the Summer Grape of the middle states, with large leaves 
dark green above and covered below through the season with rusty brown 
hairs, and small blue-black berries; Vitis bicolor of the northern and 
middle states, a magnificent plant with large deeply-lobed leaves dark 
green on the upper surface and pale blue-green on the lower surface; 
Vitis Labrusca, the common Fox Grape of New England, with leaves 
covered below with tawny white, tan-colored, or red-brown felt and dull 
green above and large berries which vary in color from dark purple to 
reddish brown or amber color. The Delaware, Concord, and other well 
known table grapes are selected varieties of this species, and this is one 
of the parents of most of the hybrid grapes which are now largely cul- 
tivated in the United States. Vitis cor difolia, the Frost Grape, an in- 
habitant of the middle states, with thin leaves light green on both sur- 
faces and with large clusters of small blue fruit which becomes edible 
after frost, is one of the largest and most vigorous of the American 
species, often growing into the tops of the tallest trees and forming stems 
from one to two feet in diameter. In spite of the beauty and value as 
ornamental plants of the American Grapevines which can be seen in the 
Arboretum it is impossible to obtain more than one or two of them in 
nurseries, as American nurserymen have not yet learned the value of 
these plants or that a demand for them exists or would exist if plants 
could be bought. 
Among Old World Grapes the most interesting as ornamental plants 
are Vitis Coignetiae and Vitis amurensis; the first, which is an inhabi- 
tant of northern Japan, grows to a large size and produces enormous, 
thick, prominently veined leaves pale on the lower side which turn scar- 
let in the autumn. This is a very vigorous and hardy plant here, and for 
northern countries one of the most valuable of all the ornamental Grape- 
vines. Vitis amurensis is a native of eastern Siberia and, although less 
vigorous than Vitis Coignetiae , it is a hardy and valuable plant for cov- 
ering walls and trellises. The Chinese Vitis Davidii is interesting be- 
cause, unlike the New World Grapevines, the stems are thickly covered 
with spines, a character which at one time caused French botanists to 
consider it the type of a new genus, Spinovitis. The leaves of this plant 
turn red in the autumn. In severe winters the stems are k illed back to 
the ground. Equally curious, perhaps, is another Chinese Grapevine, 
Vitis Pagnuccii, with leaves which are sometimes shaped like those of an 
ordinary Grapevine and sometimes deeply and variously lobed much like 
those of the Virginia Creeper. 
There are still a number of plants in bloom or still to bloom in the Shrub 
Collection, and these late-blooming shrubs are valuable and interesting 
because summer-blooming shrubs are not numerous. These flowering 
shrubs, the ripening of early fruits and the full development of the leaves 
