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Styrax japonica. The large plant of this Japanese shrub on Hickory 
Path near Center Street is now opening its abundant flowers. These 
are bell-shaped, white, and arranged in two- or three-flowered racemes 
which hang down from the branches on long stems and make this shrub 
during a week or ten days a beautiful and interesting object. The 
glabrous, drupe-like dry fruit is not particularly ornamental and the 
leaves fall late in the autumn without change of color. That Styrax 
japonica is perfectly at home in its present position in the Arboretum 
is shown by the numerous seedlings which every year spring up under 
the plant. There appears therefore to be no good reason why this 
handsome shrub should be so rare in American gardens. Although at 
least one hundred species of Styrax are now recognized by botanists, 
with four species in the southern United States and one in California, 
only two species, S. japonica and another Japanese species, S. obassia, 
have been successfully established in the Arboretum. The latter is a 
small tree thickly covered with nearly round leaves from eight to ten 
inches in diameter. These entirely hide the flowers which are nearly 
three-quarters of an inch long, fragrant and arranged in drooping 
racemes from six to eight inches in length. The healthy specimen of 
this plant on the upper side of Azalea Path bloomed earlier in the sea¬ 
son. Styrax americana, a native of the southeastern United States 
from Virginia to Florida, lives in the Arboretum in sheltered positions 
and has occasionally produced its small fragrant flowers here, but it is 
not hardy enough ever to become valuable in northern gardens. 
Summer-flowering American Viburnums. For many flowers the Ar¬ 
boretum is indebted in early summer to four American species of Vibur¬ 
nums which have been used in large numbers in its borders and road¬ 
side plantations. The earliest of these, V. dentatum, is already in 
bloom; it has handsome dark green leaves conspicuously toothed on the 
margins, and broad flat clusters of white flowers which are followed in 
early autumn by bright blue fruit on erect stems. This is a common 
roadside and meadow shrub in the northeastern part of the country. 
The second of these four Viburnums, V. cassinoides, is also in bloom. It 
is n native of swamps in the northeastern part of the country where 
it sometimes grows twenty feet high with slender straggling stems. 
In cultivation it forms a broad, low round-topped bush, and has proved 
one of the handsomest of all the Viburnums introduced into the Arbor¬ 
etum, The leaves are thick and lustrous and vary greatly in size on 
different individuals. The fruit is larger than that of the other sum¬ 
mer-flowering American species, and at first yellow-green later becomes 
pink, and finally blue-black and covered with a pale bloom, fruit of the 
three colors occurring in early autumn in the same cluster. The third 
of these summer-flowering Viburnums, V. venosum, resembles in its 
general appearance V. dentatum, but it flowers two weeks later, and 
the young branchlets and the lower surface of the leaves are thickly 
covered with a coat of stellate hairs. This Viburnum is found growing 
naturally only in the neighborhood of the coast from Cape Cod and 
Nantucket to New Jersey. A larger and a handsomer plant with larger 
leaves, showier flowers and larger, later-ripening fruit, V. Canbyi is 
the fourth of these species. It is a native of eastern Pennsylvania and 
northern Delaware where it is not common, and of central Indiana; and 
