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known to botanists or has found its way into gardens. It is perfectly 
hardy; the flower-buds are not injured by severe cold, and in time it 
will grow into a tall usually rather narrow shrub. There are no large 
plants yet in the Arboretum, but many small ones have been planted 
during the last two or three years on the sides of the Meadow Road 
and by the pond at its junction with the Forest Hills Road. 
Malus theifera, one of Wilson’s discoveries in western China, with its 
long spreading and irregularly ascending branches has such an unusual 
and picturesque habit for a Crabapple that it is easy to recognize at 
any season of the year. When covered with its innumerable clusters 
of rose-red buds and pale rose-colored or nearly white flowers it is one 
of the handsomest of the Asiatic Crabapples. Judging by the behavior 
of several plants in the Arboretum, they flower only on alternate years. 
Last spring the largest specimen in the Peters’ Hill group was covered 
with flowers; this year it has not produced a single flov/er-bud. The 
plant on the southern slope of Bussey Hill and a younger one in the 
group on the left hand side of the Forest Hills Road are now covered 
with flowers and are objects of interest and beauty. 
A New Crabapple. Flowering branches of a remarkable new Crab- 
apple have been sent to the Arboretum from a garden in Brookline. 
It is evidently a hybrid, and there can be little doubt that one of the 
parents is the curious variety of Malus purnila from Turkestan and 
southwestern Siberia known in gardens as Malus Niedzwetzkyana; the 
other might well be Malus jioribunda. Of this species it has the slender 
branchlets and the pubescence on the young leaves which soon become 
nearly glabrous and green. The bark and wood are tinged with red and 
thus show the influence of M. Niedzwetzkyana as does the red juicy flesh 
of the fruit which ripens in October and is about an inch in diameter. 
As a garden plant the value of this new hybrid is in the color of the 
flowers which is dark rose-red, and much more beautiful than that of 
the flowers of Malus atrosanguinea, which is the common red-flowered 
Crabapple of gardens. The flowers are fully an inch and a quarter in 
diameter and are produced in as great profusion as those of Malus 
Jioribunda. In habit the three plants of this hybrid which are known 
resemble M. jioribunda and are as hardy. The handsomest of all the 
red-flowered Apples which have yet been seen, this hybrid promises to 
be an important addition to garden plants. Unfortunately nothing is 
known of its history beyond the fact that the Massachusetts Nursery- 
man who sold them to their present owner bought them as Malus 
Niedzwetzkyana from some one whom he has forgotten. 
