ABSTRACT
The last petals of the cherry blossoms have only just fallen, and Nature hastens to provide a new treasure for the flower kingdom, and the first blooms of the wistaria Fuji no hana will be opening at the base of the quickly growing racemes. Not the far-famed Wistaria multijuga, whose immense long sprays of delicate mauve flowers are so associated throughout the world with the name of Japan, but the early-flowering wistaria, Brachy botris, with its tufts of white blossoms completely covering the closely pruned branches before any trace of a leaf appears. It would seem as if this modest white wistaria had been allowed by nature to bloom so early, for fear she should be overlooked and not appreciated when her more showy successor flings her purple mantle over the land. The Royal Fuji, fancifully called Niki-so, meaning “plant of the two seasons,” because, appearing between the third and fourth months (old calendar), it belongs both to spring and summer, has rightly attained her high rank among the floral kingdom of Japan, for in no other country can be seen a restaurant set out for the entertainment of perhaps a hundred guests, who will all feast wrapped in the purple haze of a roof of wistaria blossoms, all from a single vine.
