Sweet Peas. 215 



Yar. roseo, new Painted Lady or Scarlet. 



Yar. cseriileis (blue). 



Yar. atropurpiireo (dark pnrple). 



Thomas Bridgeman, in bis '' Yoiino^ Gardener's Assistant," 1838, 

 mentions " Sweet Peas, of various descriptions and colors. Latby- 

 rus odoratiis, var. alba, purpurea, rosea, striata, etc." Edward 

 Sayers, in "American Flower Garden Companion," 1838, speaks of 

 sweet peas, " purple, scarlet, white, pink, pink and white or painted 

 lady." Buist, of Philadelphia, writes that they are " well deserving 

 of culture," and says that there are "many varieties," in his 

 " Flower Garden Directory," 1815. Yet they co^ild not have been 

 very widely grown at this time, for Eley's "American Florist," 

 which appeared in the same year at Hartford, does not mention 

 them. In 1851, Breck writes in his "Book of Flov/ers" that sweet 

 peas are "deservedly one of the most popular annuals which enrich 

 the flower-garden. The varieties are white, rose, scarlet, purple^ 

 black and variegated. Every variety should be sown by itself in 

 circles about a foot in diameter, three or four feet from any other 

 plant." The custom of giving designative personal or descriptive 

 names to varieties of annual flowers was scarcely known forty or 

 fifty years ago, and we do not know just what types were then in 

 cultivation. The loose vernacular or Latin names were used rather 

 more for groups or strains of color than for any particular minor 

 variation as the names are in these days, when we have so greatly 

 refined the choice and descriptions of garden plants. The first dis- 

 tinct note of the recent popularizing and diffusion of named sweet 

 peas in this country came in 1889 with the introduction of the 

 Blanche Ferry, which is an improvement of the old Painted Lady, 

 and which is still one of our best varieties when grown from care- 

 fully selected seeds. This variety was found in a garden in north- 

 ern New^ York l)y W. W. Tracy, of the firm of L). M. Ferry & Co. 

 C. L. Allen writes as follows of its evolution, in "American Agri- 

 culturist," for September 7, 1 895 : " The farmer's wife had for 

 years been in the habit of saving her own seeds, starting with the 

 old and well-known Painted Lady. In the heavy loam of her 

 garden, and with the much shorter season of growth there than 

 in Europe, this made a more rapid growth, and annually became 

 more dwarf in habit. At the same time it became a ' cropper,' 



