1870. ] 
MALUS FLORIBUNDA. 
165 
distant and deflexed. The pinnules are oblong obtuse, obliquely cuneate at the 
base, dentate, and pellucid as in the allied species. The rachis of the pinnae is 
winged and clothed with articulated hairs. Messrs. Veitch’s parent plant has 
already a stem of a foot or more in height, and about an inch in diameter. This 
slender tree-like habit gives it quite a distinct aspect amongst its allies, which 
include some of the most lovely of cultivated ferns. 
As regards cultivation, the plant requires a shady intermediate house, and 
like other filmy ferns, to have its fronds always bathed in moisture. A dry 
atmosphere would bring to it certain destruction.—T. M. 
MALUS FLORIBUNDA. 
iPPLE-BLOSSOM ! There are, indeed, very few fiowers more beautiful than 
this, taken just while the buds are bursting open, and showing the 
beautiful deep red blush on the outside of the petals, like the bright flush 
on the cheek of a fair lady,—and with ladies Apple-blossom is always in 
especial favour. In spite of the great abundance of Apple-blossom, some a shade 
darker or a shade more beautiful than others, and notwithstanding it is so 
extremely common, there are but few who can pass by an apple-tree in all the 
glorious beauty of its full florescence without pausing to admire it. There is 
something extremely chaste and beautiful and captivating to the eye in apple- 
blossom, that is not to be found in the blossom of any other of our fruit trees, lovely 
as they also are. We would grow the Apple for the beauty of its blossoms alone, 
had we not some other varieties equally, ay, still more beautiful, which have no 
other claim to our regard. 
Pyrus spectahilis, the Chinese showy apple, is a variety pretty well known 
for its handsome appearance in our shrubberies. The flowers are semi-double, 
and just before they expand are extremely beautiful. It is greatly sought after 
for cut flowers. 
What can I say, or how in words express sufficient admiration of the more 
recent Mains fiorihunda ? Of all the lovely flowering trees in existence this most 
surely bears off. the palm. How it is that it has not come more into notice is 
indeed extremely strange, seeing that it has been in the country for some years. 
It was introduced from Japan by Siebold, who calls it Mains fiorihunda [but it 
must not be confounded with the white-flowered Indian Pyvus fiorihunda~\. 
Siebold sent it to Van Iloutte, who took but little heed of it for some years, but 
in 1865 a glowing and most gorgeous figure of it, not in the least overdrawn, 
appeared in the Flore des Serres. It is, as described in a previous volume of 
the Florist, ‘‘ as superior to Pyrus spectahilis as Charles X Lilac is to the 
common purple.” It is of the Apple section of the Pyrus family, and grows to a 
goodly size. The habit is graceful, the shoots being somewhat slender and 
drooping. The flowers are produced in greatest abundance on the young shoots, 
and hang gracefully. The buds before they open are of a bright crimson, and 
