48 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
ffl'EBRUART, 
and is suitable for any locality. It will probably 
reach a hight of fifteen feet. It is readily pro¬ 
pagated by layers and offsets, and will doubt¬ 
less soon be found in all extensive nurseries. 
Banking in size between the trees and dwarfed 
shrubs, the appropriate place of the Stuartia. 
in the landscape will be somewhat near the 
dwelling, or among the main avenues and walks 
of the lawn. Its well proportioned head, fine 
foliage, and beautiful bloom, should secure it eu 
prominent position. There is another variety, 
the Stuartia Virginica , which does not bloom a* 
freely as this, and is somewhat tender. 
-- -- — • ^-*-«■- 
Experience with the Tritoma TJvaria, 
.OVfSk—IQ • 
STUARTIA PENTAGYNIA, AS GROWING AT FLUSHING, N. Y. 
(Drawn and Engraved for the American Agriculturist.) 
With all the rage for foreign novelties pre¬ 
vailing around us, the natives of our own soil 
are too frequently forgotten, although held in 
high esteem abroad. Many of these would be 
“ real acquisitions ” here, were they imported 
at great cost from Japan or China. For many 
years a charming evergreen shrub from America 
has given a summer freshness to the winter 
landscape of England, and its parks and gar¬ 
dens in Summer are brilliant with the flowers 
of the Rhododendron. No exhibition of one 
family of plants has power to bring out the 
aristocracy of England, like the June exhibitions 
of these shrubs in Regent Park. The Kalmia in 
its varieties, is second only to the Rhododendron 
in the appreciation of Englishmen, while our 
Andromedas, Azaleas, and other flowering 
plants occupy a high place in their regard. 
Among other plants valued in Europe, yet 
scarcely known here, is the Stuartia pentagynia 
(shown at Fig. 1), a shrub of great beauty, found 
in the mountains of Tennessee and Virginia. 
Its great scarcity has kept it out of the general 
knowledge, and it is only within a few years, 
that it could be found in the nurseries in any 
quantity. Many have often looked with admira¬ 
tion on the fine specimen, standing in the 
nursery of Parsons & Co., Flushing, from which 
our drawing is oaken. Its branches commence 
about a foot from the ground, and form a 
round compact tree, or shrub, ten feet in hight, 
and about ten feet in diameter. 
In August, wnen but few plants comparative¬ 
ly, are in bloom, this bush or tree is uniform¬ 
ly loaded with large white flowers, 2J inches or 
more in diameter, saucer-shaped, with purple 
centre, and the edges of the petals crimped. A 
drawing of the blossom, reduced in size, is 
shown at Fig. 2. It has a general resemblance 
to the flower of the Magnolia, beside which, we 
know of no hardy tree or shrub, whose flowers 
can compare with, it in beauty. 
When once known, it will be considered as 
indispensable as the Magnolia in every garden, 
where a few good things are only wanted. It 
will grow in any good soil, is perfectly hardy, 
Fig. 2.— FLO want OF THE STUARTIA, REDUCED 
As this plant, which was referred to In our 
last Volume, (page 177, June No.), has hitherto 
been somewhat of a stranger in this country,, we 
have not been able to speak of it from much ex¬ 
perience. The following notes give the result! 
of one season’s observation. 
Our specimens were bought from the nursery 
in May, and set in the open ground, the first of 
June. After a little coaxing, they began to 
grow, becoming more and more luxuriant as: 
they felt more of the mid-summer’s heat. In 
August, one variety began to show a blossom- 
bud—a conical, green protuberance, the size of 
a man’s thumb. The flower-stalk elongated, 
week by week, until by the first of September, 
it had risen two feet or more high. Then the 
huge bud became resolved into a cluster of buds'- 
Each individual flower resembled the common 
scarlet trumpet honeysuckle, or some of the 
Penstemons. The color was a rich orange scar¬ 
let. There were perhaps fifty or more of these, 
compactly clustered around the upper end of 
the long and upright stalk. 
The lowest tier of buds opened first, then 
those above, and so on, until all 
passed away,—the whole time of 
the blooming of a single stalk be¬ 
ing about a fortnight. The general 
testimony of all who saw these 
plants was, that if the flowers are 
not strictly beautiful, in the sense a 
rose is, they are certainly very pe¬ 
culiar, and brilliant. Before the 
first blooming-stalk had faded, a 
second began to shoot up, which ma¬ 
tured its flowers the latter part of 
September, and continued to bloom 
uninjured by the frosts, into the 
month of October. Late in October, 
as one of our plants showed an¬ 
other flower-stalk, we took it up 
and potted it, witli very little care, 
and set it by the chamber window 
of a carriage-house, to see what 
it would do. To our surprise, it 
did not flag at all, but kept on 
growing, leaf and flower-stalk. Let 
it be noted here particularly—as 
showing the toughness of the plant 
—that in replanting it, w r e shook 
off the soil from the roots, broke ofl 
several offsets from them, and pot-, 
ted the same, and then crowded 
the mother plant into a four-quart 
pot, with no tender handling. And 
yet it took no affront at our rough 
treatment. A week or so afterward, 
seeing that it was bent on bloom¬ 
ing, we took it into the house, where 
the buds opened finely, and adorned 
in size. a parlor window with a flaming 
