IIYDRANfiEA. 259 



it was observed tliat some of tlic plants produced 

 flowers of a line blue colour, but the cause of this 

 chano-e could not be easily accounted for, since the 

 cuttings had been taken from plants with rose- 

 coloured flowers. Some supposed that it was caused 

 by oxide of iron, whilst others concluded that it 

 originated from salt or saltpetre being accidentally 

 mixed in the earth. AVe remember seeing: a fine 

 plant of this description M-ith beautiful blue flowers 

 at a cottage situated on a dreary common in Ilamp- 

 shire, where no one could at that time have ex- 

 pected to have found a common-coloured Hy- 

 drangea. The owner of the plant refused ten 

 guineas for this flower, as it was the only one that 

 had then been seen in the country, and the circum- 

 stance of a poor cottager having refused so large 

 a sum for a plant excited great curiositv, and 

 brought all the neighbouring inhabitants to see it. 

 The poor woman, although she did not like to part 

 v.ith the plant that had been reared by a child 

 Avliom she had lost, gladly sold cuttings to all 

 ■who required them, every one of which when 

 they blossomed produced flowers of the original 

 rose-colour. % 



We have since learnt that the poor woman's plant 

 had been reared from a cutting of the common rose- 

 coloured variety, and that the change was owing to 

 its being planted in the soil of the heathy common 



