inconvenience was overlooked, and the varieties themselves 

 neglected in works of science. By degrees, however, tlie 

 repeated production of hybrid plants by artificial means 

 caused attention to be paid to them ; and, while some 

 naturalists adopted the ingenious proposition of Mr. Herbert, 

 in the Horticultural Transactions , to designate them by 

 names as compound as their own nature, others, as 

 M. DecandoUe, unscrupulously admitted them as legiti- 

 mate species into enumerations of the natural productions 

 of the globe. The latter, however, was soon found out to 

 be inconvenient in the highest degree, loading works of 

 science with the records of forms so fleeting that they 

 had, in some cases, passed away before the book that 

 recorded them had issued from the press ; and in more 

 permanent cases, breaking down the distinctions of natural 

 species for the sake of plants, in the creation of which wild 

 nature had no more share than in that of the mule itself, or 

 of the various races of domestic dogs or fowls. 



No doubt from a feeling of the absurdity of thus con- 

 founding Horticulture with pure Natural History, Mr. 

 Loudon, in his Encyclopadia of Plants, rejected, in the 

 case of the Rose and the Pelargonium, all artificially 

 created forms from the domain of science, placing them 

 apart, under the name of Garden Varieties ; a plan ex- 

 tremely well adapted to distinguishing between the limits 

 of Horticulture and Botany, and answering every purpose 

 that the student of the one can require, without inter- 

 fering with the arrangements of the investigators of naturally 

 created beings. To this plan we propose to adhere with 

 the commencement of a new volume. We have always been 

 anxious to figure remarkable varieties of handsome plants, 

 and we mean to continue the practice ; but, instead of 

 referring them with doubt and difficulty to Natural species, 

 we propose henceforth to designate tliem, like this one, by 

 the particular title of Garden Variety, in order that the 

 compilers of Species Plantarum may no longer be led into 

 incorporating such ephemeral ])roductions with their lists 

 of the genuine productions of nature. 



J. L. 



