Clematis fusca Turcz.

A semi-herbaceous climber 8 or 9 ft high, stems angled, downy when young. Leaves pinnate, 4 to 8 in. long, and composed mostly of five or seven leaflets, which are ovate with a rounded or heart-shaped base, and often long, tapering points, not toothed; glabrous or slightly downy beneath. Flowers solitary on stout stalks, which are 1⁄2 to 1 in. long, and thickly covered with reddish-brown hairs. The flower has the pitcher shape of the Viorna group, the sepals being 3⁄4 to 1 in. long, the points recurved; outside they are reddish brown, woolly. Seed-vessels with tails about 11⁄4 in. long, plumed with yellowish-brown, silky hairs.

Native of N.E. Asia, from Asiatic Russia through Manchuria to the Kurile Islands. It is an interesting but not very ornamental plant, distinct in its group, because of the very short hairy flower-stalks, and the hairiness generally of the flower. It grows very well, and produces abundant seed.