February 37, 1873. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



185 



established, but as regards the position best suited for it. 

 Although the plaut will endure a great amount of cold, it does 

 not flourish everywhere, und where it does not, its appearance 

 is anything but what it ought to be. My experience with it 

 dates from some ten years ago, when I became possessed of a 

 few plants, not large ones. A part of them I brought forward 

 in pots, tho remainder I planted out in a cold pit where choice 

 Pinuses and the like were wintered. Thoy remained in that 

 pit about two years, when three or four of them were planted 

 out, two in small circular beds on the turf in a tolerably good 

 position, but not sheltered from winds, and I soon found the 

 tips of the foliage became browned and useless. Though this 

 has been by degrees replaced by other foliage, the plants still 

 present the same crippled appearance, only a portion of the 

 base of tho leaf remaining, and the points being all destroyed. 

 Of course the progress of the plant is slow ; but one plant 

 which has a more sheltered position, being planted upon a 

 south border amongst Yuccas and Irises where the wind has 

 hut little chance of injuring it, has flourished. Although we 

 have had two rather severe winters since it was placed in its 

 present position, it has never shown the least injury either 

 from wind or frost, and looks as well as other plants of a like 

 kind in pots iu the greenhouse. But it is a slow-growing plant, 

 and not likely to be a favourite with those who have tine- 

 foliaged plants to furnish by the hundred for the flower garden. 

 It must, however, be remembered that its appearance is good 

 at all times, and if grown at all it ought to occupy the favoured 

 position undisturbed for at least half a dozen years. 



As a sort of oriental poetry attaches to the name of Palm, a 

 species that will survive an English winter must at all times 

 be interesting. Patience in its culture is the only requisite 

 to insure success ; for this plant cannot bo multiplied lilce 

 the ordinary occupants of a flower garden — indeed I am not 

 sure that it can be obtained by any other means than by seeds. 

 The quality of these ought not to be too hastily condemned, 

 for about a year ago I obtained some from a London seeds- 

 man, and knowing them to be very irregular in germinating, I 

 placed each seed in a separate pot. This was done at the end 

 of January or beginning of February, and I believe none of 

 the seedlings made theu' appearance till May. Some came up 

 at various times during the summer, the last one as late as 

 November, at least nine months after sowing, while some seeds 

 have not vegetated yet, although they have beea the whole 

 time in the Pine pit. It will, therefore, be seen that the plant 

 cannot well be hurried-on in any of its stages ; time must be 

 allowed it, and unless this can be afforded I would not recom- 

 mend its cultivation ; for its growth and fine appearance, as 

 with tree Ferns and some other plants, are not secured in 

 the short period aUotted to many of the other denizens of 

 tho plant houso and parterre, but brought about by years of 

 occupation of a suitable site, — J. Robson. 



IMPERFECT HYBRIDITY. 

 Bv I. Anderson-Henht, Esq. 



Among the same batch of seedlings from which I obtained 

 Veronica Andersonii — V. saHcifolia (syn. V. Lindleyana) x 

 V. speeiosa — came one which, to all appearance, was a repro- 

 duction of the male parent pure and simple. And deeming it 

 nothing else, I presented it to a friend, V. speeiosa being then 

 comparatively a new plant ; and he, when he flowered it, came 

 to tell me that it had come a very different thing in bloom to 

 the true V. speeiosa, having much longer flower-spikes and of 

 a much lighter colour than those in that species, being of a 

 light crimson instead of a dark purple, as in tho V. speeiosa. 



A plant of this hybrid has since afforded a further illustra- 

 tion of a somewhat similar result. 



Having obtained a suffruticose species of Veronica, under the 

 name of V. Daubeneyiana, with light-coloured flowers striated 

 with pink lines, in the way of V. fruticulosa, I crossed it on the 

 last-mentioned hybrid, which became the seed-bearer. From 

 this cross I succeeded in raising only two plants ; and one of 

 these I believe I have lost. But they seemed both alike in 

 foliage and habit ; but both so like the hybrid seed-bearers 

 that I felt doubtful whether the cross had taken. I cannot 

 speak with confidence as to their being identically alike, but 

 only of their general aspect. The plant I still possess flowered 

 for the first time this past season ; and the singularity of its 

 bloom drew my attention to it more particularly than before. 

 It had, like the seed-bearer, thick fleshy pyriform leaves, but 

 somewhat smaller and more closely set on the stem ; but 

 instead of being, like it, simply cruciform, they were obliquely 



decussate, therein slightly approaching the male parent, a 

 creeping alpine species whose prostrate stems show stiU more 

 the same deflected arrangement of tho leaves. It was only on 

 a close examination of the part, however, that any resemblance 

 to the male, V. Daubeneyiana, could be observed. In fact I 

 looked upon it as another of the many failures I liad had in 

 my attempts to effect the inverse cross on it. When it at last 

 bloomed, my hopes of having effected a partial cross, if I may 

 use such a term, were strengthened. Like V. Daubeneyiana, 

 which has a spikelot with a few blooms, it came even short of 

 it, having had only two flowers, and these much lighter in 

 colour, and no nearer to the male than the hybrid female 

 parent ; but whether this is its true permanent character I 

 dare not assert, as it bore no more than this one spikelet of 

 two flowers. 



In the first of the above instances the hybrid seemed, till it 

 flowered, a repetition of the male parent ; in the second it 

 seemed, till it bloomed, a repetition of the female parent, with 

 such slight difi'erences in tho arrangement and slightly smaller 

 size of the foliage as might occur in a purely normal seedling. 

 In fact, seldom have I ever seen two hybrids with so much of 

 one parent and so little of the other. 



I have no doubt something of tho same kind occurs among 

 Rhododendrons. But I may only instance one case where I 

 crossed R. Edgworthii on R. caucasicum; tho seedlings, ever 

 few when the cross is a severe one (by which term I mean 

 such instances as where the species do not affect each other 

 kindly), were only two in number; and though now about ten 

 years old they show no indications of setting for flower. But 

 while they have both the glabrous foliage of the seed-bearer, 

 and even the ochreous tint underneath, they differ in having 

 pyriform instead of its lanceolate leaves. But though in these 

 particulars they depart from the normal state of R. caucasi- 

 cum, they have not one feature of B. Edgworthii, the male 

 parent. The other case is where I crossed the same R. Edg- 

 worthii on R. Jenkinsii. Here the seedlings, again only two 

 in number, were aU of the mother, except in having again the 

 pyriform foliage, in which, be it observed, it is a departure 

 from both parents, both having lanceolate leaves, those of 

 R. Jenkinsii being acutely so. The hybrid in this latter case 

 is budded for flower ; but the flowers of both parents are 

 white, and both sweet-scented, and among the largest of tho 

 genus, though the scent, texture, and forms of the flowers are 

 different ; so that I look for surer tests in the coming flowers, 

 though these may be more perplexing too than any that yet 

 appears. It is proper to observe that I take the utmost pre- 

 caution in all my crossing operations to prevent miscarriage in 

 any possible way. 



While treating of my diSiculties with this R. Edgworthii, 

 one of the most peculiarly constituted, as it is one of the most 

 peculiarly featured of all the Rhododendron tribe, having its 

 rugose leaves densely pubescent on the upper while it is per- 

 fectly shaggy with tomentum on the under side, every stem 

 being clothed with the same tomentum, I have another most 

 singular peculiarity to note in regard to it — namely, that 

 while it will cross other species it will take on a cross from 

 none — that is to say, while it has been repeatedly made the 

 male, it has never with me, though I have tried it often, nor 

 with any other that I have heard of, submitted to become the 

 female parent. I have crossed it repeatedly on B. cUiatum, 

 one of the minor forms, too, of Dr. Hooker's Himalayan 

 species. It has been crossed, too, on R. formosum in this 

 neighbourhood, I believe, in tho Stanwell Nursery ; but I never 

 could get it to take on any cross whatever. R. Nuttalli 

 behaved with me iu the same manner ; it would cross but not 

 be crossed ; but I did not persevere with it as I did with 

 R. Edgworthii. Now, I do not assert absolutely that R. Edg- 

 worthii, in the numerous tribe of which it is a member, may 

 not be hybridised with some other of its kindred, but I could 

 never get it to reciprocate a cross. And this remarkable cir- 

 cumstance of non-reciprocity has perplexed and defied me in 

 innumerable instances throughout my long experience in these 

 pursuits. It occurred to me that the poUen of larger forms 

 might be of larger grains, and so might not pass through the 

 necessarily small ducts of the styles of smaller species; yet 

 R. ciUatum, a tiny species of 1 foot high, was crossed freely 

 by R. Edgworthii, as I have just noticed, a species of C feet 

 high. I even crossed this latter species on a pure Indian 

 Azalea, though, by pulling the seed-pod before it was ripe, I 

 raised no seeds of this latter cross. 



In these hasty observations I merely wish to direct attention 

 to such instances of imperfect bybridity iu certain species, and 



