Jasminum beesianum Forr. & Diels

A deciduous species of variable habit, being in nature an erect shrub or a climber, or found trailing on the ground and rooting at the nodes; shoots minutely downy when young especially at the joints, slender, grooved. Leaves simple, opposite, ovate to lanceolate, 11⁄4 to 2 in. long, 1⁄3 to 3⁄4 in. wide, dark green above, greyish green beneath with short down on both sides, at least when young; stalks 1⁄8 in. or less long. Flowers usually in threes produced in the terminal leaf-axils of short, leafy twigs. Each flower is 3⁄8 to 1⁄2 in. wide, rose to carmine (also, according to Wilson, rarely pale rose to white); the corolla is tubular at the base, hairy in the throat, spreading at the mouth into usually six rounded lobes, fragrant. Fruit a rather flattened, globose berry, black, 1⁄2 in wide. Bot. Mag., t. 9097.

Native of Szechwan and Yunnan, China; introduced by Forrest in 1906 for the firm of Bees Ltd. I have never seen it noticeably attractive in flower, but it produces large crops of shining black berries which give a fine effect and remain on the branches well into winter. The completely red flowers are unique for the genus. It is quite hardy and one of the parents of J. × stephanense.