December 31, 18)1. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
555 
RHODODENDRON CHAMPIONS. 
Messrs. James Veitch & Sons, Chelsea, have been the means 
of bringing many beautiful Rhododendrons into public notice, 
especially amongst the hybrids of the so-called “ greenhouse ” 
section, but others have from time to time been introduced, 
occasionally novelties, and sometimes old, neglected, or little 
known species that are equally as welcome as the others. We 
have an example of a species which has thus been recovered, as it 
were, in Rhododendron Cb^mpionae, for which Messrs. Yeitch 
obtained a botanical certificate at the meeting of the Royal 
Horticultural Society on April 21st, 1891. A drawing was pre¬ 
pared from the specimen shown on that date, and this is now 
Captain Champion considered it allied to R. formosum, Wall., 
from Khaysa, and so it is in some respects, but abundantly dis¬ 
tinct in the form and vestiture of the leaves, ia its large glutinous 
bracts, in the form of the calyx, in the ovary and fruit, and 
especially in the copious, long, glandular bristles of the branchlets, 
petioles, peduncles, calyx, and fruit. It was found by Captain 
and Mrs. Champion, growing abundantly among rocks in a ravine 
at Fort Victoria, Hong Kong, April 28th, 1849.” 
The description then given may be condensed as follows, but 
at the time no plants were in cultivation in th's country. 
“ A shrub nearly 7 feet high ; branches terete ; younger ones 
clothed with long, spreading, glandular bristles. Leaves much 
confined to the apex of the branches, shortly petioled, lanceolate, 
Fig. 100.—RHODODENDRON CHAMPIONS. 
reproduced in the woodcut (fig. 100). When describing this 
Rhododendron in 1851 Sir W. J. Hooker wrote as follows :— 
“ We know from experience that there is no surer way of 
having a new and beautiful plant introduced to our gardens than 
by publishing a figure and giving its locality. Hence we are 
induced, as upon some former occasions in this work, to exhibit 
a species not yet in cultivation, but for the accuracy of the figure 
of which we can vouch, by a comparison of the drawing of a 
Chinese artist with native specimens ; both the one and the other 
being also accompanied by notes drawn up on the spot and sent us 
by Captain Champion of the 95th Regiment, who made extensive 
collections of plants in Ceylon, and afterwards inHeng Kong. In 
compliment to his amiable and accomplished lady, whose partiality 
for plants equals that of her husband, and who accompanied him 
on many of his botanising excursions, we have named the species, 
shortly acuminate, reticulated, dark green above, rather rusty- 
coloured beneath, the margin and veins and veinlets clothed 
beneath and rough with short, harsh, bristly hairs. Umbels four 
to six-flowered. Peduncles hispid with glandular hairs. Calyx, 
especially the margins, equally hispid, deeply cleft to the base into 
four erect, almost linear-subulate, rather long segments or sepals. 
Corolla 4 inches across, tube rather short, campanulate, white. 
Limb 4 inches across, deeply cut into five obovate-oblong, obtuse, 
unequal-veined segments, the upper one the broadest. The ground 
colour in our figure is white ; the lobes, especially the apex and 
margins, are tinged with delicate rose colour. But there is another 
state of the flower described by Captain Champion as the more 
usual colour, ‘ delicate white, the upper lip pale yellow towards 
the centre, and copiously dotted with ochre.’ ” . 
The variety exhibited by Messrs. Veitch was that just mentioned 
