14 



i.e. iu the spots upon the corolla, we know not, but certainly the corolla is tho 

 only fragrant part of the plant all through the genus Primula. 



The wealth of perfume in this genus is indeed a fact which yet needs 

 to be explained. For two or three months, a single plant will produce flowers 

 which, without any cessation, will continue to give off sufficient odour to scent 

 the air for some distance round ; and single flowers, when gathered, if kept in 

 water, or even if placed in a closed box, will continue for weeks to give out 

 perfume. That this is an actual emanation of particles, and not a mere 

 agitation of the waves of air, the perfumer proves by extracting the essential 

 oil from the flowers, and thus retaining the perfume long after the flowers are 

 destroyed or faded. Yet we find no reservoir of perfume in the primrose any 

 more than in any other flower ; we can detect no perfume in the earth out of 

 which it grows, nor trace the chymistry by which the essential oil is elaborated 

 out of the sunlight, the wind, the rain, and the soil, which seem to be the only 

 materials with which the plant works. The flower in all its parts is but a 

 developed leaf, yet neither the undeveloped leaves among which it grows, the 

 scape which supports it, nor the root from which it springs, yields the perfume. 

 It is in the flower only that it resides, and there we cannot detect its abode by 

 the eye, however aided by art. The sense of smell is the only power by which 

 we can ascertain its presence. Yet it is so abundant that the evening breeze is 

 laden with it, although it has freighted every current of air which has passed 

 the flower since sunrise. Here is a mystei'y which I commend to the notice 

 of the very wise people who will not believe anything which they cannot 

 understand. 



When we come to consider the varieties of the Primula, it will be found 

 that we have to unlearn something which we have been taught. As a character 

 of the two commonest species (P. vulgaris and P. veris) Hooker and Arnot 

 say, " tube of the corolla with a circle of scale-like folds at the slightly 

 contracted mouth." In regard to the existence of the folds, there is no 

 question, but the accuracy of the expi^ssion " scale-like" may be doubted as 

 far as this district is concerned. I have examined a great number of 

 specimens, in this and preceding years, and have been quite unable to 

 discover one in which the folds have any resemblance to scales. To my eye 

 they are obviously folds, not very strongly marked, present in all the inter- 

 mediate forms between P. vulgaris and P. veris, but in none assuming the 

 appearance of those appendages to leaves which we find in many plants, and 

 which are generally understood by the term "scales." In the Primulas the 

 folds are mere puckerings of the membrane of the corolla, having concavities 

 at the back, and being unmarked by any thickening of the membrane or any 

 projection or appendage. 



Hooker conforms to custom so far as to rank P. vuhjaris, P. elatior, and 

 P. veris as species, but he adds a protest against their being so considered. 

 Other botanists give us P. grandiflora, P. acaulis, and P. intermedia ; which 

 Hooker unites with vulgaiHs. He adds a doubt whether P, elatior is really 



