Carsten Burkhardt's Web Project Paeonia - The Peony Library

PEONIES

The Manual of the American Peony Society

EDITED BY JAMES BOYD

Copyright 1928 by American Peony Society

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THE MOUTAN TREE PEONY

By John C. Wister

I. INTRODUCTION

BOTANISTS distinguish a number of peonies with woody stems from the many species which are herbaceous. Best and longest known of these is the common or moutan tree peony, the name being derived from the Chinese Mow tan or Muh tang or Meu tang. It is said to grow wild in the province of Kansu, north of the river Hoang Ho in China, and has been variously described as growing from 3 to 6 to 10 feet high in the wild state. Curiously enough, the wild form has only comparatively recently (1911) become known, and there is practically no literature about it, most of the botanical, horticultural, artistic, and historical references being to garden forms originated by the Chinese, some of them over 1,40x3 years ago. Even the most ancient authors refer to it as a flower long cultivated, and it was known to eastern civilization from Chinese designs, paintings, poetical and medical references long before the plants were exported from China.

II. BOTANY

*Paeonia suffruticosa ^1,2,3,4 Andr. Syns.: P. moutan, Sims; P. arborea, Bonn. Stems 3 to 6 feet or higher, much branched, distinctly shrubby. Leaves glabrous, leaflets more often entire at the base of the plant than above. Flowers large, various in color, as rose, red, and white. Follicles numerous, very hairy, rather small. May, June. Northwestern China. Shensi: Tai-pei-shan 1910 and 50 li west of Yenan Fu 1910, W. Purdom. First mention of its native habitat by Engler & Prantl, (Nat. Pflanzenfam. Ill, i, p. 55, 1891) as in Kansu north of river Hoang Ho. Bretschneider (Hist. Eur. Discov. China, p. 425) mentions that the Chinese say it occurs wild on Moutan-Shan, but Purdom could not find it there. Between 1890 and 1896 it was collected by Hugh Scallan and G. Giraldi near Kusan, Gniw-ju and Lun-Shan in Shensi.

Note also that botanists distinguish two other woody species:

*Although suffruticosa is the accepted botanical name, moutan is much more commonly used.—J. C. W.

1,2,3,4 See end of article for these and other references.—editor.

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P. lutea, a beautiful single yellow discovered in China in 1883, now the parent, with P. moutan, of several yellow and yellow-red hybrids raised by Henry, by Lemoine, and by Saunders; and P. Delavayi, discovered in western China in 1884.

III. HISTORY----CHINA

The Chinese distinguished the common (herbaceous) peony or Sho Yo from the "improved" or moutan, tree peony, the former being preferred for the medicinal property of its roots and the latter for its ornamental value.⁶ Indeed, Chinese writings have led modern scholars to assume that some of the ancient Chinese believed they had actually by their gardening skill produced the tree peony from the herbaceous peony. The tree peony was called by them "The King of Flowers" and the herbaceous peony "The King's Ministers." The name moutan means "male scarlet flower," in consequence of the scarlet sort being considered the finest of all, the word male referring to the propagation by division instead of by seed. Various Chinese authors from Hung King (536) to Le She Chin (1596) speak of the natural distribution of the tree peony, each attributing real or fancied advantages to plants from certain provinces, first in relation to the medicinal value of the roots and second in relation to the size, range of color, and beauty of the flowers. They prefer the roots collected in wild places, stating that those grown in gardens and heavily fed to produce large flowers lose their medicinal value. The book "Origin of Matters and Objects" says that the distribution of the plants as ornaments in gardens began during reign of Emperor Yang (605-616), and this has led later writers to infer that before this they were grown for their medicinal properties only. This same book states that "when these plants were brought into notice their cultivation was in a very short time so augmented that in 713-741 they could be met with everywhere, as well about the huts of the lower classes as about the noble seats of the great. Many new sorts were raised during that period." Many quotations from the Chinese are translated by D. I. Hoffman, of Leyden, in 1849,⁵ who quotes a genealogical register of the moutans, about the year 750 as enumerating thirty named varieties, among the list of which were:

Ya ou.......Double; yellow.

New Kea.....Double yellow; smaller.

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This Dutch author, however, doubts the existence of a yellow sort and thinks translation of the Chinese word "Hioang," used by Ngan Yang Sen, author of the "Chinese Monograph on the Peony," as yellow has been incorrect. (Note, first, that Paeonia lutea had not been discovered in 1849; second, that there is no reason to believe that Chinese gardeners ever possessed P. lutea before it was discovered by westerners; third, that early 19th century explorers reported yellow tree peonies, which on being sent to Europe never proved to be yellow; and fourth, that Japanese gardeners commonly produced both yellow flowers and blue flowers on white peonies by the use of dyes, as will be noted later.)

Soo Kung (656) tells of a fine white variety that the peasants called "Pih leang Kin," meaning "a hundred ounces of gold," and it was commonly known as "the Glory and Pride of the Chinese," and these old stories may account for later European references to high prices of the plants, which may have been as fictitious as the blue, violet, and black varieties referred to in many articles.

In the middle of the igth century, European explorers reported the tree peony as native to central China, though their references make it doubtful if they found any plants actually growing wild. Fortune⁶ corrects the earlier European impression that the plants grow wild at Canton, stating that there is an enormous trade in the plants which are brought yearly by boat more than a thousand miles from Hoo-nan where they are grown in the mountain regions. Here their culture is reported to be as much of a mania as tulip-growing in Holland, with choice varieties selling for "100 ounces of gold." Plants are dug in winter, shipped in open baskets with scarcely any soil on the roots, and on arrival in Canton are potted, that warm climate starting them at once into growth. They are then sold to ornament halls, balconies, and gardens, price depending on the number of flower-buds on a plant. After flowering they are thrown away, as the natives of Canton know that they will not thrive in that hot climate without a winter rest- Fortune

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further states that it is the Chinese custom to graft on herbaceous roots in the field, and that it is very seldom that a graft fails to grow. Many other writers speak of this Chinese method and its uniform success, but Fortune is one of the few who mention that before the grafting takes place the herbaceous roots have been potted and forced into growth. Just how this is performed is not made clear in any of the references I have found.

Other authors of this period report that the Canton plants also came from Nankin and attribute the death of many plants en route to England to have been due to the way the Canton merchants cut the roots when potting. Some intimate that the Chinese exporters did not want the plants to live, even charging that they scalded seeds before selling them to foreigners. Hovey, writing in 1836⁷, before it was known that Canton was not the original home of the tree peony, was quite outspoken concerning the standard of honesty of the Chinese merchants, stating that "The Chinese are so selfish in regard to all the plants they possess, that, whatever price is offered, they are reluctant to sell them and oftentimes deceive purchasers by selling the most common kinds for those quite rare, and this, too, when the rare ones, to us, are as abundant in their gardens as the more common."

Up to the time of Fortune's trip to China (1846), the European gardening papers report receiving hundreds of so-called distinct varieties, all of which, when blooming, turned out to be the same five or six that were first imported between 1780 and 1810.

Robert Fortune was the first to go into central China in search of plants. During his travels he visited some of the tree peony nurseries and in 1846 brought back plants to England, details of which will be noted later. The interesting fact to be noted here is that 'his collection was the finest ever brought from China to Europe, and that, apparently, there is no record of any other Chinese garden varieties having been imported since. We have no knowledge whether the Chinese garden peonies of today are the same as they were in 1846, or whether improved varieties have appeared there just as they have in western gardens. Perhaps they have not changed for centuries —perhaps Fortune's description of a mandarin sitting for hours smoking, drinking tea, and gazing at a tree peony covered with 400 flowers has been typical of oriental life and philosophy for

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thousands of years in the past and will continue so in the future in spite of revolutions and changes in the outside world.

Quite recently Trollope⁸ has mentioned the moutan peony growing magnificently in the cold climate of Korea where he says it needs protection in winter. There is a peony show on the palace grounds of the ex-Emperor every summer. Mr. E. H. Wilson told me recently that the finest tree peonies he had ever seen were in Korea.

It seems strange that with this long history of peony-growing it is only very recently that the plant has been discovered growing wild. It was first found by Hugh Scallan and G. Giraldi near Kisan, Gniw-ju, and Lun-Shan, in Shensi, between 1890 and 1896, but they did not collect any living plants or seeds. In 1910 Purdom found it 15 miles west of Genan in Shensi⁹ and sent seeds to Veitch in England and to Professor Sargent. At the Arnold Arboretum is the original herbarium specimen collected by Purdom, and also a specimen taken from the only plant raised from Purdom's seeds. About fifty of the seeds sent to Professor Sargent germinated, but the young plants were destroyed by rats; the Veitches however, raised a plant which they sent to Professor Sargent later, and the specimen is from this plant.

In April, 1914, Farrer came across it in Kansu above the Blackwater Valley, and again up near the Tibet border, growing mostly in loess but also in or near magnesian limestone. In his book "On the Eaves of the World"¹⁰ he tells of reaching Fu-erh-Gai, a tiny place, after a long stage. In the evening he crossed the stream and climbed up in the wooded hills. "So I sat at last and rested, gazing down the steep loess tracks to the little village so pleasant-looking in its grove of poplars, till my eye was caught by certain white objects farther along the hillside, that were clearly too big by far to be flowers. . . . Through the foaming shallows of the copse I plunged, and soon was holding my breath with growing excitement as I neared my goal, and it became more and more certain that I was setting eyes on Pceonia moutan as a wild plant. The event itself justified enthusiasm but all considerations of botanical geography vanish from one's mind in the first contemplation of that amazing flower, the most overpoweringly superb of hardy shrubs. Here in the brushwood it grew up tall and slender and straight, in two or three unbranching shoots, each one of which carried at

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the top, elegantly balancing, that single enormous blossom, waved and crimped into the boldest grace of line, of absolute pure white, with featherings of deepest maroon radiating at the base of the petals from the boss of golden fluff at the flower's heart. Above the sere and thorny scrub the snowy beauties poised and hovered, and the breath of them went out on the twilight as sweet as any rose. For a long time I remained in

worship and returned downward at last in high contentment. »>

Farrer states further, that along upper reaches of the Black-water it has dark rich magenta-crimson colored flowers, and that along the southern fringe of Kansu it is always of purest white. "No doubt different districts, when China is yet farther searched, may reveal yet other divergences of color. ... I wish I might one day set eyes on the wild original of that marvelous variety which is forced so freely for the Chinese market and is sold for extravagant sums at mid-January in Peking. It is like the one we call Reine Elizabeth, which is still the most gorgeous of all tree peonies in point of color, and is very likely Reine Elizabeth herself in the country of her birth. . . . China continues its immense demand for moutans, and the supply continues inexhaustible, though the most cherished forms are rare and do not often appear on the market. A black one is talked of and is of an intensely dark maroon; green and blue ones are almost certainly chimaeras, such as Chinese imagination likes to invent as the special treasure of some lonely monastery far away in the sands of Shin-jang or the desolate moorlands of the Koko-nor.. The most precious of all is the so-called yellow, which merely indulges in a faint 'greenery-yallerly' flush spreading from the base among the tumbled whiteness of the petals.

"The moutan is par excellence the national flower of China . . . paupers, prelates, and emperors affect its charms, and there is hardly a house or an abbey up the Border without its bush or two . . . while the Imperial Palaces revel in rows upon rows of them arranged in narrow shallow terraces, each just wide enough for a single line of plants, and piled up one behind another till the effect of that towering long bank all ablaze with blossom must surpass the wildest imagination of the show bench. ... I cannot but feel that in similar raised terraces the peonies might find better drainage and kindlier

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conditions in England where at present they still remain more loyally obedient to the wishes of their late Imperial mistress than do her other special favorites, the Palace doglings, one of whose special points, as laid down by Her Majesty's own hand, was that they should 'bite the foreign devils instantly." "

IV. HISTORY—JAPAN

The history of gardening in Japan is interwoven with the history of religion. Wilson states¹¹ that Buddhism in its Chinese form was introduced from Korea to Japan about 552 and that from then until the 8th century Korean and Chinese monks visited Japan to proselyte. These monks brought with them to Japan the apple, pear, plum, peach, apricot, cherry, quince, orange, and other fruits, and such ornamental trees as the ginkgo, yulan, and sophora. Among flowering garden plants they brought the tree peony. Hoffman states⁴ that the Japanese authors do not know whether the common peony was originally Japanese or not, but that all are agreed that the improved moutan varieties came to them from China. The name moutan being brought with the plant was soon changed or corrupted to "botan" or "bhotan," which is still the Japanese word for peony. From the days of the Mikado Seimo (724), the peony enjoyed great esteem. Some Japanese authors refer to its medicinal value and agree with the Chinese doctors that the wild plants are superior to those grown in gardens. Others speak of its beauty and estimate the number of distinct kinds as anywhere from five hundred to a thousand, state that the best flowers are seen near Nara and Yamato, speak of a variety called "Thousand Petals," a name reminiscent of a Chinese variety previously mentioned, but which is reported as a full double scarlet. Reminiscent of China also is the story that wealthy people pay 100 ounces of silver for a plant, and this, with an early reference to a black peony, Kuro-botan, lead one to wonder how much of the Japanese author's remarks were original and how much copied from some Chinese author he had read or heard of. (Kuro-botan, by the way is the name of a modern Japanese deep maroon variety.)

The first European reference to tree peonies in Japan is contained in a very short note of Kaempfer in 1712.¹² This merely refers to "Paeonia major" with a woody stem which he saw while in Japan in 1690-1692 in the service of the Dutch East

plate XXXI. Phoebe Cary

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India Company. Thunberg,¹³ a physician of the same company, who visited Japan in 1775, also describes the tree peony but erroneously calls it P. officinalis. Later travelers hardly mention the tree peony at all, nor did they send plants to Europe, which Wilson believes due to the fact that they thought the varieties they saw identical with the Chinese varieties sent to Europe between 1783 and 1842. Further search of records may bring to light the history of the remarkable race of Japanese tree peonies, but Hoffman's remarks in 1849 and a short article by Siebold in 1858, from which quotations will be made later, are apparently the last references to them made in Europe until Japanese nursery companies began exporting plants commercially about 1890.

Hoffman⁵ goes into great detail in translating from the Japanese author Ito Ifei, from the Japanese Encyclopedia, and from various Japanese gardening manuals; but while his remarks are supposed to be of value as a treatise on cultivation, few of them can be practically translated into our different climate, soils, and economic conditions. Yet it is interesting historically to observe their minute directions for preparing soil, "one-third black peat, one-third well-rotted leaf-mold, one-third common garden soil," or "one-third river bog, one-third garden soil, one-third sand." Another note states that the entire soil must be changed once a year or after six or seven years the plants will stop blooming, and often the date of transplanting is given as "the autumn equinox, or the day before or day after." More curious is the direction that "the soil must never be tamped with the foot as with other plants," but must be left loose after planting. Quite modern is the advice that "the use of animal matter as manure is injurious," although other parts of the same work apparently recommend strawy manure for winter mulching and the use of fish. The favorite fertilizer is rape-seed oil-cake, and also "one-fifth part ashes from burned straw."

Beds should be half a foot or more higher than path to guard against superfluous moisture which the plant cannot resist, "particularly the red varieties." Covers should be given to protect from burning sun, stems should be scraped each autumn with a spoon of willow wood after which they should be rubbed with linen "containing a camellia fruit" to give an oily polish. In winter, most authors declare, stems should be covered with

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mats, but Ito Ifei disapproves of this and says it causes stems to wither in spring. And covers must be supplied to keep off rain; the common use of oiled paper for this is denounced as dangerous. Each December 21 the soil should be dug from the roots and a powder of sulphur and dripstone [from Japanese grottoes] sprinkled on, and then soil replaced, and after warning against excessive fertilization Ito Ifei says plants should be manured not oftener than twice a year! He states that if plants are sickly they should not be manured at all but replanted in rich clay, and after telling us that "a powder of Pih leen roots protects against worms," and that "a worm in the stem can be cut out with a bamboo needle," he says in another place that "Individuals must work these things out for themselves" and that "a plant attacked with rot at the roots often suddenly dies," which latter remark every grower of tree peonies will greet with a wide and knowing smile.

Some of the remarks on propagation are, however, quite illuminating. The Japanese Encylopedia states that "the most magnificent flowers are generally raised from seeds. These should be sown as soon as seed-pod begins to open and nine out of ten will grow, but if dried hardly one in a hundred will germinate." Some growers crack outer shells with a wooden hammer; others soak seeds in water several days. Seed should be planted 1-2 inches deep and should be protected from hot sun by mats. It is further reported that the seedlings should not be transplanted until the second year and some will flower the third year [!! ] but "should flowering be delayed, the flowers are better."

Although grafting was practiced in China before the time of Soo Sung (1023-1063), the Japanese had no knowledge of it until about 1700. Several kinds of grafts are mentioned, the first "Tsugo" or "joining" being an ordinary side graft on moutan stock, this being the first mention of moutan as a stock, for the Chinese apparently used herbaceous roots only. The practice of placing a tile around the graft and filling with soil later gave way to a method of splitting a bamboo around the graft and filling with clay. The second method described is the graft on the herbaceous root.

Another method of propagation (which is not very clearly described) is by pushing a branch through a hole made in the bulb of a caladium and then laying under the soil. Whether the

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branch remains attached to the old plant till roots form (layering) or whether the branch is cut off (and becomes a cutting) is not made clear by either the text or the illustration. A fourth method mentioned seems much too good to be true. "Cut roots in pieces and lay in pots in soil and in a little time they form new shoots."

Tree peonies flower in Japan about May i. When the buds begin to swell, about one-third of them should be removed to make the remaining flowers larger. And most insistent is the direction to cut off wilted flowers to prevent seed-formation exhausting the plant. The flowers are mostly white, red, and purple. Half-yellow flowers are produced "by manuring white varieties with Bjak juts." The flower-buds also may be wrapped in a yellow paper and the dye will be soaked into the flower. It is also reported that blue flowers are secured "by sprinkling [soil or flower?] with ink and water." To keep cut flowers the cut surface should be burned and waxed over, or dipped in hot water.

Berger¹⁴ states (1899) that tree peony culture in Japan amounts to a regular worship and that each individual plant has its straw thatch and is watered, fed, and given light and shade to prepare for the yearly show at Yokohama. Unger¹⁵ describes a trip to a Kinobe nursery in 1901. He reports the tree peony is called "The Flower of Prosperity," that it is grown in sandy clay, manured with rape-seed cake twice a year, and irrigated. Tops of plants were always used for grafting and plants sold with three or four good flowering buds, no older plants being seen here though there were plenty at the Kioto show. Conder¹⁶ states that the peony is delicate and needs scrupulous care and nursing. The flower is a favorite of the upper classes, and is often called "the flower of twenty days" because it lasts that length of time. There are over ninety distinct kinds, and the flowers are a favorite subject for design and decoration, its companions being the peacock, the golden pheasant, and the Shishi, a kind of conventional lion from Chinese designs. "In such company it forms the constant decoration of temple and palace walls." The poet Tung Po appeals for greater appreciation of the flower saying that "The floral monarchs should be visited in the morning. He who should see their splendour in the afternoon cannot be considered a good judge."

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V. HISTORY----EUROPE

On March 17, 1656, the first Embassy of the Dutch East India Company to China started up the river from Canton and, after crossing mountain ranges and traversing lakes and rivers, reached Peking on July 7 where they were received by the Emperor. This Embassy had freer access to the country than those which followed. On returning to Holland, Nieuhof¹⁷ wrote an account of the trip, describing tea, pineapples, and tree peonies, which he reported as generally white with a little purple but also yellow and red. He described the flowers as being like roses but twice as large and without thorns, and the account of them appears not to have been taken seriously for no attempt was made to get the plants for over a hundred years. Then Sir Joseph Banks, excited by reading this account and by seeing Chinese drawings, engaged a Mr. Duncan, "a medical gentleman" attached to the British East India Company, to procure a plant. Mr. Duncan secured a plant in Canton about 1784 or 1786, sent it to England where it flowered at Kew in 1787 or 1789 and was named Pteonia Moutan Banksi. (Boursault introduced this into France in 1801 but whether from China direct or from England is not clear.) This was described as large, 4 to 8 inches across, very double, light pink, fading as the flower opens to faint blush or white at the edges, and at the base deepening to purplish red.^{18> 19} The original plant lived at Kew until 1842 when it had to be moved on account of building operations.³

In 1794, the variety rosea, or rosea semiplena,^18,20 a single or semi-double deep rose-pink, was imported, followed by rosea plena in 1797. In 1802, Capt. James Prendergast, of the Hope, brought from China, for Sir Abraham Hume, of Wormelybury, another plant which bloomed in 1806. This was a single white (on old and strong plants sometimes semi-double) 10 inches or more across, with large purple spots at the base, and was named papaveracea,^{18, 21} not on account of its resemblance to the flower of a poppy but because its germens, when enveloped by their membranous covering, resemble a capsule or seed-vessel of the common Papaver somniferum. Botanists of that day considered this to be the true species and gave it the long name of Paeonia Moutan papaveracea, making the two previously imported plants P. Moutan papaveracea Banksi, and P. Moutan papaveracea rosea, and for thirty years or more all tree peony

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variety names were prefixed by this long handle. Sabine¹⁸ states that by 1826, that is in twenty-four years, this original plant had formed a bush 7 feet high and 40 feet in circumference, and produced 660 buds, 130 of which were disbudded to increase the size of the remaining flowers. This statement, and another of a fourteen-year-old plant of Banksi at Henley, 5 feet high and 27 feet around, hardly bears out the constant complaints in the English gardening press from that day to this about the extreme difficulty of growing the tree peony in the English climate, or of Watson's famous remark²³ that "the plants die a foot for every 6 inches they grow," and would lead us to wonder whether this original papaveracea was a plant of unusual vigor which later seedlings or importations lacked. It is interesting to note that in the early years of the century, plants sold for ten guineas each. By 1825 this price had dropped to one guinea and by 1836 to three and a half shillings.

Other early importations were Humei, in 1817, by some believed identical with Banksi, and Rawesi in 1820. Sabine's paper,¹⁸ in 1826, is the most complete account published up to that time and tells that in addition to the above imports, the Earl of Mountmorris sowed seed in 1817 or 1818 of which three plants bloomed in 1826 and were named albida plena, anneslei, and carnea plena.

While importations from China continued from the time of Sabine's paper to the time of Fortune (1846), nothing new seems to have been brought in. Meanwhile, seedlings began to appear on the continent. The Baumann Nursery, at Bollwiller, on the upper Rhine, in 1836 lists ten varieties, six of which are their own seedlings (with long Latin names). Noisette, one of the first to grow tree peonies in France, and who sold some of his first plants for from 1500 francs to 100 louis, offered twelve new seedlings in 1839; Mathieu of Belleville offered four seedlings and David three, but little or no reference to these earlier varieties is made in later catalogues or periodicals. The first introductions of any lasting value, were apparently those of His, of Versailles, in 1839 and 1842, among these being Hissiana, Josephine Imperatrix, and Carolina. In 1846, Jacob Makoy, of Liege, introduced Lambertinae. In 1846, Seneclauze listed thirty-six varieties, and in 1849 Triomphe de Vandermaelen either first flowered or was introduced by J. F. Vandermaelen, of Brussels.

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It is interesting to note, however, that a seedling finer than any of these, except the last named, had bloomed in Ghent in 1836 from seed sown in 1823 by an amateur named Goethals. This man was an egotist and so selfish that he did not want anyone else to have this variety, and apparently only his most intimate friends were allowed to see it. It is reported that he kept two "enormous" dogs on guard over this plant, night and day, for nearly thirty years. Indeed, it was not until 1863 that descriptions of it began to appear in the gardening press under the name of "Gloria Belgarum."²⁴ It was a brilliant cherry-rose and crimson, full double, and over 10 inches across, and Siebold was reported to have said it was finer than anything he had seen in his travels. Goethals was reported to have sold the first plants in 1861, but an earlier catalogue reference makes one wonder if propagating-wood had left his garden without his permission and in spite of the two enormous dogs.

It was left to Robert Fortune to discover the finest Chinese tree peonies, so long known by legend, and to bring them back to Europe in 1846. The gardening press of the next few years contained many references to his plants, which began to bloom at the Royal Horticultural Society's garden in 1847, and which were named and described as they flowered. Great disappointment was expressed when the "black peony" bloomed and turned out not to be black but merely a very deep purple, and greater still was the disappointment when the wistaria-blue bloomed a very ordinary lilac color. But, on the whole, the reception was most enthusiastic. The plants were propagated and offered by English and continental nurseries so that in the 60's there was a wave of popularity which, unfortunately, was soon checked by their high price (owing to their slow propagation) and their poor growing qualities. Among the twenty-five or more varieties²⁵ were the following which made a permanent impression on tree-peony growing and which, undoubtedly, were the parents of many of the fine seedlings that began to appear on the continent: Atropurpurea, Atrosanguinea, Berenice, Bijou de Chusan (nothing more exquisite than this can be imagined), Dr. Bowring, Globosa, Gloire de Shanghai, Lord Macartney, Pride of Hong Kong, Purpurea, Robert Fortune, Samarang, and Zenobia.

The first published record of Japanese tree peonies in Europe is of an importation by Siebold in 1844²⁶ This is described as

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a. magnificent collection from the Imperial Gardens of Tokio and Kioto, containing the 42 finest varieties of the Empire. These began to bloom in 1848, some in the garden of Prince Frederick of the Netherlands, others in Siebold's trial garden, and were awarded medals at flower shows. The single and semi-double flowers were described as covering the entire range of color that we know today, and of the same large size as the modern Japanese varieties. Drawings of these were taken to England to John Lindley, who wrote "I have examined the drawings of the peonies brought to England by M. Von Siebold and I can state that they are very fine things, and for the most part are different from anything sent to the Horticultural Society by Fortune."

The varieties that flowered in Prince Frederick's garden apparently never found their way into commerce, but some of those in Siebold's garden were offered in the Krelage catalogue of 1867 at from $1 to $12 each. Only two or three varieties seem to have survived and to have been offered by other nurseries. L. Bohmer, a German nurseryman of Yokohama, is said to have made the first commercial exportations in 1866, but to all intents and purposes there were no tree peonies of Japanese origin to be had in Europe until they began to come in from the Japanese nurseries in the 90'$.

The popularity of the tree peony during the 60's and 70's can be seen from the fact that in Germany, in 1864, Haage & Schmidt offered 61 varieties; in Holland, in 1867, Krelage offered 190 varieties, including 18 of Siebold's Japanese varieties; in Belgium, in 1873, Van Houtte's catalogue listed 168 varieties; in France, in 1869, Verdier advertised 25,000 plants (about 20,000 more than there are in all of America today!) in 20 varieties, while a little later (in 1887) the German firm of Ludwig Spaeth claimed to have 350 varieties although, unfortunately, the catalogue does not give the names, and, as late as the 90's, Paillet, near Paris, listed 337 kinds. Many of these catalogues mention that a large number of the finest varieties come from Italy, but whether they were raised from seed or imported from China or Japan is not stated. One of them, Elizabetta, said to have been raised by Casaretto, is probably identical with Reine Elizabeth which is still, without any doubt, the finest double (Chinese type) tree peony. It seems probable that there were several men raising seedlings near Milan, but I have not been able to get any definite information about

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them. The accompanying check list of varieties, however, gives fairly definite information about the sorts raised in France and Belgium.

The English, French, Belgian, and German gardening papers contain many references to tree peonies, but they are of surprisingly little value either from an historical or a cultural viewpoint. For nearly fifty years they have continued to copy Sabine's remarks¹⁸ with or without acknowledgment, and any particular subject treated in one paper seems to go the rounds of all the others in a few months. Their remarks seem to travel in a cycle of (a) appreciation of beauty, (b) hope and prediction of great popularity, (c) astonishment that the plants are so little known, (d) remarks on danger of spring frosts, (i) remarks on difficulties of propagation. Careful directions concerning potting and forcing are given again and again, but as the century draws to a close the references are fewer and fewer. The old growers died and with them, apparently, died the desire for large collections of double tree peonies. A few modern French and Dutch wholesale nurserymen list a dozen to twenty-five varieties. For larger collections we must turn to the specialist, Auguste Dessert (succeeded by Doriat & Cie. about 1922). He had, between 1900 and 1920, the finest collection of double tree peonies, and he also was one of the first (1905) to offer in Europe the Japanese types of Moutans under Japanese names. I can find no reliable record of when these first reached Europe. The earliest Japanese catalogue printed in English that I have seen is 1893, and it does not offer the plants as novelties. As noted above, Krelage had Japanese varieties in 1867 but only a few of them were later to be found in nursery catalogues. These were undoubtedly mostly Siebold's importation, but some may have been from Bohmer as noted above. Kelway offered plants in England, under English names, as early as 1889, some of which were single and therefore presumably of Japanese origin. Goos & Koenemann offered Japanese varieties without names in 1894. Japanese varieties were exhibited in Paris under French names in 1896 or 1897, and Lemoine, always on the lookout for new plants, catalogued a few in 1903. But it is to Dessert's catalogues that we must turn for a representative list. He had the same troubles others have had with Japanese plants —more than half were not true to name—but he worked over them, straightened out the confusions, gave French names to

234 MANUAL OF THE AMERICAN PEONY SOCIETY

those hopelessly mixed, and sent plants to America to be the basis of our tree-peony knowledge. But nowhere in Europe do the Japanese Moutans appear to be flourishing now, and I do not know of a single nursery offering plants for sale (the Doriat catalogue describes such varieties but does not offer plants). The fact that a Dutch wholesale nursery has recently been trying to purchase the entire stock of a large Japanese grower, however, leads us to hope that a revival may be at hand.

VI. HISTORY----AMERICA

Tree peonies reached America from England in the early years of the igth century. Prince, always a pioneer, lists Banksi, papaveracea, and rosea in 1828, and is reported to have raised a seedling of his own before that time. One of the earliest American accounts is by Landreth²⁷ in 1832. In 1835, Hovey started the American Gardeners' Magazine, and its columns during the next ten years contain many tree peony notes. For instance, in May, 1836, he writes,²⁸ "Those truly magnificent under-shrubs, Pseonia Moutan papaveracea and Banksi, though yet rare, are perfectly hardy and flower freely in the border this month. They may also be grown in pots and wintered in the cellar where the garden is small and the borders occupied with other plants." A little later²⁹ he writes that the tree peonies "are among the most splendid plants of which our gardens can boast. They have long been cultivated in England and have there become quite common. So much so, that there are probably but few gardens that lay any pretensions to beauty which are not adorned by the gorgeous blossoms of this fine tribe." The next sentence, though written in 1836, could be used without the change of a single word to describe 1928 conditions. "In this country they are as yet unknown to country gardens; and perhaps with the exception of the amateur and nursery collections in and about our principal cities few if any plants are to be found. The comparatively high price which they have commanded and still command, may be perhaps, one cause why they are less often seen; but we apprehend a better reason is, that they are almost unknown."

The same year, a plant at Mr. J. P. Cushing's, in Belmont, Mass., is mentioned as seeding freely if stigma is properly impregnated. In 1843 a cross (papaveracea X Banksi) made by John Sherwood, of Philadelphia, in 1836, flowered and won a

THE MOUTAN TREE PEONY 235

#5 prize at the exhibition of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. The same year Marshall P. Wilder, President of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, exhibited 100 cut flowers in 15 varieties, and this was repeated for a number of years, but tree-peony culture does not seem to have spread, for in 1864 we find the following English quotation which is followed by a comment which is just as true of our day as of the time it was written. "The Gardeners Chronicle states that 'with such beautiful plants on our hands (Fortune's varieties are referred to) it may be naturally thought good use would have been made of them but such has not been the case."' They had been neglected because so slow and so difficult to propagate, with the result that they were practically lost to cultivation in England but still appreciated on the continent. Hovey adds³⁰: "To some extent these remarks apply to our country. The tree peony is yet rare in our gardens. It is too slow a plant for us Americans. We must have something like a verbena which can be had in full bloom and sells cheap."

Many old plants, 3 feet high and 4 to 5 feet across, of a double pink tree peony, which is probably Banksi (although the color is not quite that of some of the old pictures of Banksi) are to be seen around New York and Philadelphia, and they prove that the tree peony not only will thrive here but that it will survive extreme neglect and continue to bloom freely year after year. In Professor Sargent's garden, near Boston, is an old plant, perhaps a hundred years old, a single white which corresponds with the original description of papaveracea. Professor Sargent's gardener states that it is much more vigorous than the modern varieties. But there are apparently no traces in our gardens of the tree peonies that were so popular on the continent between 1860 and 1890, nor does a search of gardening literature of those years enlighten us much. With the increasing popularity of the herbaceous peony in the early years of the new century, it was natural that attention should again be called to the tree peony and, drawing upon Dessert and upon Japanese nurseries, collections of both the Chinese and the Japanese types were again built up. The cream of the Chinese double types, whether of Chinese origin, like Bijou de Chusan, or of European origin, like Athlete, Carolina d'ltalie, Reine Elizabeth (which, as Farrer suggests, may really be Chinese), Souv. de Ducher, and Triomphe de Vandermaelen,

236 MANUAL OF THE AMERICAN PEONY SOCIETY

are certainly with us now whether they came over before or not. And with them we have the more dainty Japanese single and semi-double types, with a greater and more fascinating range of color, and also the modern Japanese double varieties which have an airiness and a sparkle lacking in the heavier and more sedate Chinese flowers.

I can find no published record of first introduction of Japanese tree peonies into America, but it is known that Professor Sargent brought back a collection of a dozen varieties when he returned from Japan in 1892, and that most of these grew and flowered well. Many seedlings from these plants were grown by him and proved to be more robust than the imported plants. A little later, Mr. E. O. Orpet reported the plants hardy in another Massachusetts garden.³¹ The best public planting I have seen is at Highland Park, Rochester, New York, where there is a long border of plants about 3 feet high and 3 to 4 feet across, all of them seedlings raised there from seeds grown on imported plants which afterward perished. The largest commercial collection in the country was that of the late Bertrand H. Farr, and his company still grafts tree peonies by the thousand. The American Peony Society, which has done such magnificent work for the herbaceous peony, has never done its full duty toward the tree peony. I hope that in the future it will be able to bring together the scattered growers of tree peonies and that, with them, it will solve the difficulties of culture and propagation which proved too much for the able but unorganized horticulturists of the last century. The tree peony is too beautiful to be kept permanently from Our gardens because it is expensive or difficult. Certainly the increasing love of gardening should before long develop gardeners with both the will and the ability to grow these gorgeous flowers.

VII. CULTURE

(i) The foregoing notes on the history of tree peonies in China, Japan, Europe, and America shed some light on the possibilities of this wonderful plant and on the many difficulties that attend its cultivation and which have prevented its being widely grown in this country. Can we, in the face of the known difficulties, succeed with tree peonies ? If we cannot, are we not a pretty poor race of gardeners, and had we better not confine ourselves to petunias, portulacas, privets, and like plants which

THE MOUTAN TREE PEONY '237

are propagated quickly, easily, and cheaply, and which succeed, for a while at least, even in the hands of the most ignorant? I have nothing against them but I do not wish to see American gardening effort confined to plants of that type. Furthermore, I have faith enough in the American gardener to believe that he can and will conquer the difficulties of the tree peony and for that reason append the following brief cultural directions, knowing their limitations full well but hoping that others will correct them or add to them so that in time valuable information may be made available to all. Certain it is that no one of the many hundreds of tree-peony references I have looked up gives much of practical value for peony-growing in the various climates of this country. But by piecing many of them together and mixing them well with the practical experience of men like Mr. Farr and Professor Saunders, and other gardeners with whom I have talked or corresponded, and whose help I freely and gratefully acknowledge, I believe that these notes are a good, solid basis for a beginning.

(2) Let us remember, first, that the wild tree peony, as found by both Purdom and Farrer, grew high in the mountains and was used to cold weather and snow in winter and hot weather in summer. This may explain the failures to grow it well in England and may mean it is not a plant for our north Pacific Coast. The failure of the Chinese to keep it alive at Canton again indicates the need of winter rest and probably shows that it will not do well in our extreme southern states. Furthermore, it is not a plant for extreme cold, so that winter protection is desirable in Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, northern New York, and the northern Mississippi Valley states. This still leaves us an enormous strip of country from Boston south to Richmond and west to Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City, etc., where the plant should succeed without protection.

(3) Any good garden soil should do, but, probably, a sweet soil is better than a sour one (the magnificent plants at Rochester are on a natural limestone soil), and new soil is preferable to an old garden soil. A reasonable amount of humus, to protect against drought, and plenty of sand and gravel for good drainage are desirable. In low land, raised beds or tile-drainage seem imperative. Animal manures, except very old rotted cow-manure or sheep-manure, should be avoided. Bone-meal and wood-ashes are safe and desirable, but quick growth given by

238 MANUAL OF THE AMERICAN PEONY SOCIETY

strong nitrogen fertilizers is apt to be susceptible to physiological wilt and botrytis. Japanese directions to feed after flowering are in line with modern scientific knowledge, but it must be done carefully. Mr. Peter Bisset, of the United States Department of Agriculture, has suggested half a pint of nitrate of soda per square yard about June i; other experts consider such strong fertilizers dangerous. Watering in dry weather is, of course, desirable.

(4) Transplanting is safe in September, October, or November, and even old plants move easily and successfully. It seems to be desirable to replant grafted plants 6 inches to a foot deeper than the plant originally stood in order to encourage formation of roots above the graft.

(5) March and April are the danger months in localities when growth starts early. Dessert, in central France, suffered from frost damage nearly every year, but only once in the past nine years have my plants been severely injured, and that year (1921), apples, pears, peaches, cherries, and the like, suffered similarly. A position sheltering plants from early morning sun is therefore desirable—in fact, many believe half-shade ideal. In such a location the flowers will last longer and the color will be better. The single flowers especially are fragile, and protection from rain will give an additional week or more of flowers.

(6) San Jose scale occasionally attacks the stems. Spray in late November or in winter with lime-sulphur or oil. Botrytis* is an ever-present danger; at any sign of wilted stems cut and burn affected parts. The United States Department of Agriculture recommends spraying with Bordeaux mixture as a preventive, but I know of no one who has tried it systematically. Inspectors of the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture believe some blasted buds are due to insect attack and advise that all such buds in evidence during or after the blooming season be cut and burned. Rabbits sometimes eat young branches in December; against this plants may be protetced with straw, wire, or other covering. Winter protection by covering or wrapping with straw or other material is desirable north of New York.

(7) Pruning, even so severe as cutting to the ground, may be desirable at times. New shoots are soon formed.

*See Fungous Diseases and Pests of the Peony, by Dr. Weiss, page 167.

THE MOUTAN TREE PEONY 239

(8) Seeds are nature's method of propagation, and some believe the safest and surest methods of getting healthy and long-lived plants. The Japanese believe seed-formation very exhausting and injurious to the plant, but I can see no difference in vigor, growth, or freedom of bloom between plants allowed to seed and plants whose flowers are cut. Seed ripens in Philadelphia between September i and 15; further north during October. All agree the seed should be planted at once, but whether at once means when pods begin to open and seeds are light brown and sticky, or a week or so later when they have turned black, I do not know. Japanese advice to plant 2^£ inches deep seems a little extreme, but certainly seeds must be covered an inch or more or they will wash to the surface. No information as to special treatment of seed is available—research here might bring valuable information. No American, as far as I know, has equaled the Japanese story of germinating nine seeds out of ten; on the contrary, all report low percentage, usually less than 20 per cent, even with fresh seeds. Roots are formed the first summer but very few tops appear until the second season. On account of this tender root-growth, Professor Saunders believes seed-beds should not be subjected to freezing the second winter. One flower will produce from five to thirty or more seeds, which run about 1,600 to the pound. Kelway reports sowing in open ground, one seed every 6 inches in the row. American practice is to plant more closely, perhaps only an inch apart. Japanese advice not to disturb till end of second growing season is probably good as roots of one-year plants are very delicate. Transplanting should be in September or earlier—Saunders suggests July. Bought seed may be valueless because too dry, and if from Japan there is the danger that they are taken from the common, single, purple, grafting stock, and that all flowers will be purple. Hand-crossing of flowers may give more seeds and more fertile seeds than when fertilization is left to insects; and experiments by plant scientists will undoubtedly teach us how to get a higher germination. Sprays of Semesan or Uspulun have been suggested to prevent damping off of young seedlings. I am confident that in a few years we shall learn how to double or more than double the number of plants secured from a pound of seed. We may also learn which varieties give good seedlings and which give flowers of inferior size or color.

240 MANUAL OF THE AMERICAN PEONY SOCIETY

(9) The Chinese have grafted Moutans on herbaceous roots for at least 900 years, and this method remains today the surest, quickest, and most satisfactory way to increase any individual variety. But whatever its results in China, it has its drawbacks with us, and no less a person than Mr, W. Watson, former director of Kew, has severely criticised²³ the herbaceous stock as unnatural and uncongenial. The Japanese get twice the growth in a given time by grafting on Moutan roots, proving Mr. Watson's point. But objections to the use of Moutan stocks, to be considered below, outweigh (in my opinion at least) its advantages. I believe the practical solution is to regard the herbaceous root not as a stock of any permanence, but as a temporary nurse to keep the top alive for a few years while it is forming its own roots. To do this, a long cion, 2 or 3 eyes (which, unfortunately, is extravagant of bud-wood), should be used, and plant sunk to the top bud. Dessert claims single-eye cions never make good plants. The cion may begin sending out its own roots the second or third year. I suspect (though I am not yet in a position to prove this) that plants failing to make a good root system of their own above the graft will not be satisfactory growers or long lived.

The actual grafting is not difficult, a three-cornered cleft graft being used in herbaceous root about an inch across. The work is slow, however, because the tree peony wood is pithy and does not cut cleanly. Grafts are tied with raffia and waxed or paraffined, then placed in frames. Glass sash, whitewashed or shaded, should at once be placed on the frames and kept on tight for at least a week or ten days. Apparently, this is of greatest importance. The Chinese suggestion, of forcing the herbaceous peony into root-growth just before grafting, may be of value. August is the usual time for this work, though July, September, and March have also been suggested. The young grafts should, of course, be kept from freezing the first and perhaps the second winter. Various persons report a 40 to 80 per cent stand from such grafts, which does not seem to equal the reported work of the Chinese where scarcely a failure is to be seen.

(10) The Japanese practice of grafting on Moutan stocks gives much stronger plants, but the stock suckers so badly that only a very careful gardener can keep the cion alive the first few years. Farrer has stated that after the third year no more

plate XXXII. Walter Faxon

THE MOUTAN TREE PEONY 241

suckers are produced. I hope he is correct. As with grafts on herbaceous stock, the plants should be set very deep to encourage the cion to form its own roots. As far as I know, Moutan stocks have not been much used outside of Japan but Professor Saunders has suggested propagating a seedling or other variety that is on its own roots, by grafting a cion on a piece root. This might be tried in winter just as apples are root-grafted.

(n) Cuttings have never been used commercially as they are uncertain and slow, but about 40 per cent are said to root if wood is taken in September and kept in a close frame. Soft wood cuttings in April under propagating-frame or bell-jar in greenhouse are occasionally reported as successful.

(12) Layers made in the fall are said to root in two years, but some method of stool-layering—cutting off tops, sinking plant in peat and sand—may be preferable. Such methods require plants that have been established for some years. Such plants can often be divided when transplanting. The Japanese story about root-cuttings certainly deserves a trial. Oriental poppy and Japanese anemone are commercially propagated this way, so the story should not be dismissed as a myth until thoroughly tested.

(13) It is evident from the above that we have a good deal of practical knowledge, but much more is needed and must come from careful study and research. Upon the American Peony Society devolves the duty of encouraging such research. The Society is the proper body to organize this work, to encourage investigators, to steer them into proper channels, to prevent wasteful repetition or concentration on minor or side issues until the main points are thoroughly investigated. Its splendid work of the past with herbaceous peonies through men like Ward, Fewkes, Farr, Saunders, Brown, Coit, Batchelor, and others must not only be repeated but extended in this more difficult and, therefore, to some, more fascinating section of the great peony family. Its full duty will not have been done until it has made the tree peony popular and available as a garden flower. Such a work may take many years but it can be done; and I shall feel very proud if the above notes and the accompanying check-list and color classification shall have done their small part in starting the Society toward this very ambitious and very distant future goal.

242 MANUAL OF THE AMERICAN PEONY SOCIETY

REFERENCES

(1) Bailey. Cyclopedia of Horticulture, p. 2434.

(2) Rehder. "Manual of Cultivated Trees and Shrubs," p. 214.

(3) Bean. "Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles," Vol. II, p. 121.

(4) Plantae Wilsonianae, Vol. I, p. 319.

Paeonia suffruticosa And. Bot. Rep. VI, t. 373 (1804).

P. arborea Donn Hort. cantabr. ed. 3, 102, 1804.

K. Koch Dendr I, 444, 1869.

Dippel Hanb. Laubholzk t. 162, 1893.

Schneider Ill. Hanb. Laubholzk, I, 272, 1904.

P. papaveracea And. Bot. Rep. VII, t. 463, 1806.

P. moutan Sims, Bot. Mag. XXIX and 1154, 1809.

Acton Hort. Kew Ed. 2, III, 315, 1811.

Anderson Trans. Linn. Soc. XII, 252, 1818.

Huth, Bot. Jahrb. XIV, 272, 1892.

Diels in Bot. Jahrb. XXIX, 324, 1900.

fruticosa, Dumont de Courset, Bot. Cult. Ed. 2, IV, 862, 1811.

(5) Johann Hoffman, 1849. "Kultur der Pioenen" in Dutch.

Translation of "Notes relating to the History, Distribution and Cultivation of the Pseony in China and Japan," from the original Chinese. Published by the Royal Netherlands Horticultural Society reports for 1848, p. 18-37, and retranslated into English by Polman Mooy and published in Paxton's Magazine of Botany, XVI (1847), p. 85-89, 109-114, and translated into French, Soc. Agr. Bot. Gand., An. V. 263-269, 304-310

(6) Robert Fortune, in Gardener's Chronicle, Feb. 7, 1880, p.179-80

(7) Hovey in American Gardener's Magazine, 1836, p. 335.

(8) Trollope Arboretum Coreense, about 1918-20.

(9) Letter from W. Purdom to Veitch, June 17, 1910. Letter from W. Purdom to Veitch, March 20, 1911.

(10) Farrer. "On the Eaves of the World," p. no.

(n) E. H. Wilson. Introduction to Monograph on Azaleas.

(12) Engelbert Kaempfer. "Amoenitates exoticae" (1712), p. 862. "Botan, yisitate and ad characterem; it Fkamigusa & Hatskangusa. Poeonea major stirpe lignes sureoo, folio ramoso, lainiis inaequaliter dividis."

(13) C. P. Thunberg. Flora Japonica, 1784.

(14) H. H. Berger in Florists Exchange, quoted in Gardeners' Chronicle, Jan. 28, 1899.

(15) A. linger (L. Boehmer & Co., Yokohama), in Gardeners' Chronicle, Oct. 12, 1901, p. 270.

(16) J. Conder. "The Floral Art of Japan," p. 14; quoted in Gardeners' Chronicle, Nov. 9, 1901, p. 336.

(17) Nieuhof, 1656; trans, in English 1669. Quoted in Floricult Cabinet (1857), p. 60.

(18) Jos. Sabine, 1826. Transactions London Horticultural Society, Vol. VI, June 6, 1826, p. 465-92. He quotes also Geo. Anderson Transactions Linnean Society, Vol. XII, p. 248-90, 1817, or 1818.

(19) Curds Botanical Magazine, 1154.

(20) Botanical Cabinet. 11: 1035.

(21) Botanical Cabinet. 6: 547.

(22) Curtis Botanical Magazine, 2175.

(23) W. Watson. London letter in Garden & Forest, Vol. Ill, p. 320, July 2, 1890.

(24) Gardeners' Chronicle, XXIX (1863), p. 36.

(25) Garden, Jan. 10, 1885. Article by Max Leichtlin.

(26) Siebold. "Flore des Jardins," 1858, p. I.

THE MOUTAN TREE PEONY 243

(27) D. Landreth, Floral Magazine and Botanical Repository, Phila., 1832.

(28) American Gardeners Magazine and Register, Boston, 1839, Vol. II, p. 256.

(29) American Gardeners Magazine and Register, Boston, 1839, Vol. II, ]

(30) American Gardeners Magazine and Register, Boston, 1864, Vol. p. 301.

(31) E. O. Orpet, Garden & Forest, June 20, 1894, Vol. VII, p. 246, and Vol. IX, p. 236, June 10, 1896.

ADDITIONAL REFERENCES

description

Bradley—III, 392. Soc. Hort. Paris, Ann. XVI, 409, 1838.

Poiteau, Rev. Hort. Ill, 258-61, 1835-8. Soc. Hort. Paris, Ann. XIX, 46, 1836.

Daklerup—in Havetid V, 491-564, 1831.

Poiteau, Soc. Hort. Paris Ann. XXIV, 330-41, 1839. Soc. Hort. Paris Ann. XXVII, 22-4, 1840.

Hort. Ann. Ill, 1*25, 226, 1842.

Poiteau, Soc. Hort. Paris Ann. XXXI, 33-39, 1842.

Henry, Rev. Hort. VI, 63-4, 1845.

Lemoine, Hort. Ann. VI, 61, 1845.

Morren, Soc. Agric. Bot. Gand. Ann. 119, 1846.

Morren, Soc. Agric. Bot. Gand. Ann. 202-4.

Poiteau, Soc. Hort. Paris, Ann. XXVII, 307, 1846.

Lindley, Hor. Soc. Lond. Journ. II, 308, 1847.

Lindley, Hor. Soc. Lond. Journ. Ill, 236, 1848.

T. Floricult Cab. 1857, p. 60, Trans, from Belg. Hort. & Flore Jard.

Flore Jard. Ann. I, 1-3, p. i; 187, pi. 6.

Bentzien, Dansk Haugrhd, X, 78, 1858.

Doll. Ver Bebord Gartenb. Preuss Wochenschr. I, 106, 1858.

Neubert, Deutsch Mag. Gard. Blumenk. 1859, p. 19.

Ibach, Soc. Hort. France Jour. VIII, 315, 1862.

Rouillard, Soc. Hort. France Jour. IX, 697, 1863.

Gard. XXXI, p. 76, 1887.

Gard. XXXVIII, p. 370, 1890.

Rehder, Moller D. Gartn. Zeit. XI, 201, 1896.

Gard. LII, p. 325, 1897.

Andre, Rev. Hort. 1898, p. 60.

cultural

Bradley, Vol. II, p. 200.

miscellaneous

Am. Peon. Soc. Farr, Bulletin 22, p. 26; Wister 9:40, 18:12, 22:53, 25:14.

Floral Mag. t. 311.

Flore des Serres, 5: 440-46 8 K, 1849.

Florist & Pomologist, 1873.

Fortune, "A Journey to the Tea Countries of China," pp. 320-327, 1852. Garden, Oct. 18, 1890, Vol. 38, p. 370. Also 1887.

Gard. Chronicle, June 5, 1841; April 9, 1842, p. 241; May 25, 1878, p. 66 Dec. 21, 1878; Feb. 7, 1880, p. 179; Feb. 4, 1885; July 27, 1907; May 2, 1908, p. 276; July 18, 1908, p. 50, 73; June 21, 1913, p. 424; Dec. 12, 1914, p. 387; Jan. 30,1915, p. 56; April 20, 1907, p. 253.

Garden & Forest, III, Sept. 30, 1890; July 2, 1890, p. 320, 435; Vol. IV, June 10,1891, i, 271; Vol. V, May 31,1892, p. 234; Vol. VII, May 30, 1894, p. 216; Vol. IX, June 10, 1896, p. 236.

244 MANUAL OF THE AMERICAN PEONY SOCIETY

Journ. d'Horticulture, Vol. 2, p. 89; 1845.

Journ. Hort. Pratique, Vol. 10, p. 300; Vol. 12, p. 385 (1854); Vol. 14, p. 27.

L'lllustration Hort. Planche 313, Vol. X, Planche 577.

Lin. Soc. Trans. XII, 248-90, 1818. Geo. Anderson Monograph.

Le Bon Jardinier almanack, 1806, p. 636; 1813; 1837; 1840, Vol. 2, p. 787; 1844, Part 2, p. 862; 1851, p. 632; 1858, p. 1316-17; 1854, p. 1311;

1860; 1867, p. 642.

Neue Allgemeine Deutsche Garten-und-Blumenzeitung, Vol. 6, p. 230; Vol. 7 (1851) p. 27, p. 170, p. 381.

Revue Horticole, Oct. 1833, p. 292-299; April 1836, Vol. 3, p. 226-232; July 1836, Vol. 3, Plate III, p. 242-6. Ser. 2, Vol. 4, p. i8j, 205, 215, 331, 585; Vol. 5 (1841), p. 3, 19, 121; 168;

370. Ser. 3, Vol. 2 (1848), p. 286; (1898), p. 60.

Revue Horticole Belgique XVI, 1890.

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TREE PEONY CHECK-LIST