11 
subhirtella is increased by the fact that the flowers often remain in 
good condition for ten or twelve days, and longer than those of the 
other single-flowered Cherry-trees. This Cherry can be raised from 
soft wood cuttings and by grafting on its own seedlings. These will 
grow into tall trees with long straight trunks {Prunus subhirtella, var. 
ascendens) and in Japanese temple gardens are sometimes fifty feet 
high with trunks two feet in diameter. This is a common tree in the 
forests of central Japan, and grows also in southern Korea and central 
China. Until Wilson's investigations in Japan in 1914 this tree seems 
to have been entirely unknown in western gardens. Raised from the 
seeds of Prunus subhirtella, which are produced in large quantities 
every year, it grows here rapidly and proves to be a handsome tree. 
It has the drooping flowers of the well-known Prunus pendula of gar- 
dens which is only a seedling form of P. subhirtella ascendens and for 
which the correct name is Prunus subhirtella variety pendula. This 
tree is not known to grow wild, but has for centuries decorated court- 
yards and temple grounds in central and northern Japan. The largest 
tree seen by Wilson was sixty-five feet tall with a head as broad as 
the height of the tree. There is a form of P. subhirtella (var. au- 
tumnalis) with semidouble flowers which blooms in both spring and 
autumn. This is a shrub often cultivated in Tokyo gardens, and in the 
Arboretum first flowered in May, 1915. 
Prunus yedoensis. This is the Cherry-tree which has been most 
generally planted in Tokyo. It is a small tree with smooth pale gray 
bark, wide-spreading branches, and large pale pink or white flowers 
which usually open before the leaves unfold. No old trees are known 
in Japan, and the origin of this Cherry is uncertain. It has not been 
found growing wild in Japan, and Wilson after studying it in Tokyo 
was inclined to believe that it was a hybrid. But, whatever its origin, 
it is a hardy tree which produces beautiful flowers and should be better 
known in this country and in Europe. Last year the flower-buds were 
killed by the winter cold; now the Arboretum tree is covered with 
them. 
Prunus serrulata, var. sachalinensis. This tree, which was called 
Prunus Sargentii until it was discovered that it had an older name, is 
believed to be the handsomest of the large Cherry-trees of eastern 
Asia. In the forests of northern Japan and Saghalin it is a tree 
often seventy-five feet high, with a trunk four feet in diameter; it has 
large pale pink or rose-colored single flowers, large dark green leaves 
which are deep bronze color as they unfold with the opening flower- 
buds, and small globose fruits which are bright red at first when fully 
grown and become black and lustrous when ripe. In western countries 
this tree was first raised in the Arboretum in 1890 from seeds sent 
here by Dr. William Sturgis Bigelow, of Boston, and of the trees in- 
troduced by the Arboretum there is none of greater beauty. It has 
been found that the seedlings of this tree are the best stock on which 
to graft most of the double-flowered Cherries which are so highly prized 
by Japanese gardeners, and that the reason why these plants have 
