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in Massachusetts. It has much larger flowers in longer racemes than 
the other American species from which it can be distinguished by its 
longer calyx-lobes and by the glandular hairs on the calyx and flower- 
stalks. A fine form of this plant was once common in gardens under 
the name of Wisteria magnifica which has often been incorrectly con- 
sidered a variety of W. frutescens. Another form with blue and white 
flowers has been described under the name of var. albo-lilacina. W. 
macrostachya, although the flowers are less showy than those of the 
Asiatic species, is a beautiful plant which is too little known in gar- 
dens. The American Wisterias bloom later than the Asiatic species 
and prolong the Wisteria season for several weeks. 
Wisteria venusta. The earliest of the Wisterias to flower is W. ven- 
usta, and although this plant had been sent to the United States and 
Europe for several years by Japanese nurserymen, nothing was really 
known about it until Wilson’s visit to Japan in 1914 when he found 
that it was a distinct and undescribed species distinguished by broad 
clusters, not more than six inches long, of very large flowers on stems 
an inch and a quarter in length and by the soft hairs which cover the 
lower surface of the leaves through the season. This plant, although 
it has long been grown in Japanese gardens where there are very large 
specimens, is not Japanese, and it is now believed to be an albino 
form of the blue-flowered Wisteria which is cultivated in Peking and 
other gardens of northern China but which has not yet been described 
by botanists or brought to this country. If this opinion of the origin 
of W, venusta is correct it should prove hardier than any of the other 
Asiatic Wisterias and perhaps make it possible to extend much further 
northward the successful cultivation of these plants. The flower-buds 
of W. venusta are well developed in the autumn and it is the easiest 
of all Wisterias to bring into bloom in the winter by artificial heat. 
There is a form with double flowers (var. plena) which is occasionally 
cultivated by Japanese florists and is known in England. 
Wisteria sinensis grows naturally in central and southern China, and 
is the common Wisteria in the gardens of the United States and one 
of the most vigorous of the hardy climbing plants of the northern 
hemisphere. In New England country gardens the flower-buds are 
often killed by cold, and it grows better on city houses where it is 
more protected than in the country. In the southern states, where it 
often grows to the tops of trees more than a hundred feet high, and 
in California it is seen in its greatest magnificence. The white-flow- 
ered form is the only variety of this plant which has yet been found. 
Wisteria floribunda. This is the common Japanese Wisteria and is 
found growing naturally only in the central and southern parts of that 
country. It has smaller and more fragrant flowers in narrower and 
more open clusters than the Chinese plant, and blooms here ten or 
twelve days later. This Wisteria is one of the most generally culti- 
vated garden plants in Japan, and Wilson found in a garden at Kasu- 
kabe a plant which extended over a bamboo arbor one-sixth of an acre 
in extent and was covered with flower-clusters which measured up to 
sixty-four inches in length. This garden form with the long clusters 
has been distinguished as variety macrobotrys. On wild plants the 
flower-clusters are sometimes not more than ten inches long, and in 
