53 

 PLANT'S ANISANTil 



Garden Variety, 



This beautiful plant is a mule obtained by Mr. Plant, 

 Nurseryman, Cheadle, from whom specimens were received 

 in September, 1841, with the following note. 



" It originated here, and bloomed for the first time in 

 1838. It is the produce of seed from Anisanthus splendens 

 and Gladiolus Colvillii, the latter, as you know, itself an 

 hybrid. The present one is, as far as my humble abilities 

 will allow me to judge, exactly intermediate betwixt the two 

 parents; the bulb is also intermediate, being entirely wanting 

 in that peculiar mode of increase which obtains in Anisanthus 

 splendens — I mean by means of tubers, or in the manner of 

 potatoes — a fact which Sweet has taken no notice of in esta- 

 blishing the genus Anisanthus. In the practice of hybridizing 

 we know but little yet. Would you believe that I have some 

 seedlings between Gladiolus and Amaryllis ? I have this day 

 taken the roots up, some of which present a most curious 

 appearance ; neither bulbs nor scales, but something of both." 



Here is not only a tine addition to flowering plants, but 

 abundant subject for consideration. In the first place we 

 have a mule between two different genera ; for, although the 

 Anisanths and Corn-Flags are only distinguished by the ex- 

 treme obliquity of the flower of the former and their peculiar 

 mode of propagation, and are consequently regarded by many 

 Botanists as separated upon insufficient grounds, yet it must 

 be confessed that their differences are fully as great as in other 

 cases are admitted as good marks of genera. 



But supposing the Anisanths and Corn-Flags to be of the 

 same genus, at least there is this remarkable in the history of 

 this plant, that one of its parents is itself a mule. 



What, however, are we to say of Mr. Plant's observation 

 as to his having crossed the Corn-Flag and Amaryllis ? We 



