The mountain laurel is being stripped from its native hills in wholesale quantities: first, by the nurserymen, for the decorative planting of private estates; second, by collectors of Christmas greens. In the blossoming season the bushes are mutilated by thoughtless persons—collectors who will sell the flowers, and thoughtless, greedy persons who "can't stop picking because they are so beautiful." The present moment is the only portion of time these people consider.
The makers of wooden spoons, ladles, rustic furniture and pipes are despoiling the Southern woods of rhododendron and laurel. The end of these beautiful heaths is not so far off, unless the ruthless destruction of them in the wild woods can be checked. There is no more beautiful garden shrub than Kalmia. It is easily propagated from seed in nurseries, and should be obtained from these sources. It is hardy and thrifty farther north than rhododendron. Transplanting from the wild is pre carious business with heaths, and the average person fails utterly.
In the name of this genus, Linnus commemorates the devoted labours of Peter Kalm, the Swedish traveller and botanist, through whose eyes "the father of botany" saw the wonderfully rich and varied flora of the New World.
3. Genus ARBUTUS, Linn.
Madrofia (Arbutus Meqiesii, Pursh.)—Evergreen shrub or tree 4o to too feet high, with smooth, reddish brown bark, and smooth red branches. Wood heavy, hard, strong, reddish brown, close grained. Leaves alternate, persistent, entire, rounded or heart shaped at base, oval or oblong, 3 to 4 inches long, smooth, shining above, glaucous beneath. Flowers white, in erect panicles, 5 to 6 inches long, monopetalous, ovate, inch long, perfect.
Fruit a globular, many-seeded berry, inch long, orange red, edible. Preferred habitat, well-drained soil in situations protected from dry winds. Distribution, coast region, British Columbia to California; on mountain slopes becoming shrubby. Uses: Valuable ornamental tree in warm-temperate climates. Wood used for furniture, charcoal, and bark for tanning leather.
"The Madrona, clad in thin, smooth, red and yellow bark and big glossy leaves, seems in the dark coniferous forests of Washington and Vancouver Island, like some lost wanderer from the magnolia groves of the South." No American tree of considerable size equals this one in beauty the year around. It bears large conical clusters of white flowers, above the vivid green of its leathery leaves. The tree is further lightened by silvery leaf linings. The red-brown trunk and bright red branches add a rich colour note, which is intensi fied when the copious scarlet fruits appear and the two-year-old leaves turn to scarlet or orange in the autumn. Even among the redwoods this arbutus is a tree that commands attention and admiration at every season. The wood tempts the charcoal
burner to chop down trees whose beauty ought to save them from destruction. The Japan Current makes them hardy in the west coast regions, and they thrive in the gardens of western and southern Europe.
The Mexican Madrona (Arbutus Xalapensis, H. B. K.), similar to the previous species in essential characters, but small in stature, has wandered up along the mountains from Mexico, and grows scattered along the limestone hillsides of western Texas. Handsome as it is, this tree is not yet known in cultiva tion. The Mexicans use its wood to make stirrups. It is also used for tool handles and mathematical instruments.
The Arizona Madrofia (Arbutus Arizonica, Sarg.) is strik ingly beautiful in the contrast of its white trunk, red branches, and lustrous pale green leaves, to which are added in spring feathery plumes of white flowers, and in the fall clusters of deep orange-red berries. It grows on high mountain slopes, but has been introduced into cultivation.
The Strawberry Tree (Arbutus Unedo, Linn.), related to our Madronas, is cultivated in Southern gardens. This brilliant little European tree bears in the fall its rosy flowers in nodding clusters along with its large scarlet fruits. It is hardy in warm temperate regions, but requires shelter from the wind. It is also offered by dealers in red-flowered varieties.
This little deciduous tree, whose sour-tasting twigs and leaves temporarily assuage the thirst of the hunter lost in Southern woods, deserves mention for this, even if it had no other redeeming traits. Besides, the tree is beautiful in its bronze-green spring foliage and its long compound racemes of tiny, bell-shaped flowers, and later, in its autumnal robes of vivid scarlet. It is a heath in all its characters recognisable by its prim little flower bells and the dry little capsules that succeed them. Hardy as far north as Boston, it is occasionally seen in American gardens, and in western and central Europe.