CAMELLIA, a genus of plants of the natural order ternstrcendaeem (q.v.), natives of China, Japan, and the n. of India—some of which are now among the most common and admired green-house shrubs in Britain and other countries too cold for their cultiva tion in the open air, receiving the same sort of attention which is bestowed on other florists' flowers, and with the same result, of an endless multiplication of beautiful hybrids and varieties. The best known and most esteemed is a Japonica. Its leaves are ovate-elliptical, almost acuminate and serrate, shining; the flowers without stalks, mostly solitary, large, and rose-like. It is a native of Japan; and there and in China it has been carefully cultivated from time immemorial. In its wild state, it has red flowers; and the red single C. is much used by gardeners as a stock on which to graft the fine varieties, the flowers of which are generally double, and in many cases most completely so. Many of them are of Chinese or Japanese origin; many have been raised by cultivators in Britain, continental Europe, and America. Their colors are very various; and the varieties also differ much in the form and position of the petals. It adds to the value of the C. that its flowering time is in autumn, winter, and spring. By those who can afford the expense, entire houses are often devoted to the culture of camellias. Some culti vators are careful to protect them from direct sunshine, others recommend an opposite treatment in this particular; it is agreed by all that free access of air is of great import ance, and that water must be given very liberally, yet with such caution that the soil may never remain soaked after the immediate wants of the plant are supplied. The cultivation of camellias in the windows of houses is often attended with disappointment, from the buds dropping off when almost ready to expand, which is generally owing either to a neglect or an excess of watering; an apparently slight mistake, either of the one kind or of the other, being very speedily productive of this evil. Too much beat at
this time is also apt to cause the flower-buds to fall off. The C. flowers well, when the temperature is kept not very much above the freezing-point, but frost it cannot bear. In the s. of England, some of the varieties are occasionally trained to walls in the open air, receiving a little protection in winter. The proper soil for camellias is a loose black mold; a little sand and a little peat are often advantageously mixed with loam to form it. Camellias are often propagated by cuttings, often by layers; but the finest varieties very generally by grafting or by inarching. The single C. is also propagated by seed, and in this way the best stocks for grafting are procured.—Of the other species of C., the most hardy, and one of the most beautiful, is C. reticulata, from which not a few of the varieties now in cultivation are partly derived.—C. oleifera is extensively cultivated in China—not, however, in the more northerly parts—for its seeds, from which an oil is expressed after boiling, very similar to olive oil, and much in use as an article of food and otherwise in the domestic economy of the Chinese. The seeds of almost all the species, however. yield this oil.—C. Sasanqua bears the name of SASANQUA TEA. It is cultivated in China for the sake of its flowers, which are said to be used for flavoring certain kinds of tea.
CAMELLIA'CEzE, an order of exogenous trees and shrubs in s. and e. Asia and South America; North America has four species. The tea plant and the camellia are specimens.