HYBRIDS AND CROSSES OF CLEMATIS. 313 
No. 401.—Hysrip BETWEEN THE LARGE FLOWERED CLEMATIS ‘ ORIFLAMME’ AND 
© C. COCCINEA.’ 
Here, again, it is C. coccinea which has furnished the pollen. The 
hybrid has preserved nearly all the characters of vegetation, foliage, 
shoots, and buds, but the flower opens with a widened tube, and the 
sepals, thick and fleshy, of a violet-purple colour dotted with darker 
points, are variable in number, sometimes four, as in coccinea, sometimes 
five and even six, as in the Clematis ‘ Oriflamme.’ 
This hybrid is almost sterile. 
CLEMATIS ‘ VILLE DE Lyon,’ DESCRIBED AND FIGURED IN THE 
‘“ RevuE Horticote”’ oF Aprit 16, 1899. 
This marvellous plant is without a doubt one of the most beautiful 
which has been obtained in the Clematis species. It is principally on 
account of this plant and in order to exhibit it to those taking part in 
the Conference that I am here; and it really seems to me the most 
worthy of that honour among all those which I bring to the notice of 
this assembly. 
Its hybrid origin is not doubtful if we consider its actual birth. This 
testifies that it is the product of an artificial fecundation effected with 
the aid of pollen of C. coccinea upon a large flowered Clematis named 
‘Viviand Morel,’ a variety not yet in commerce. 
At first sight the general aspect of the plant seems to belie this 
origin: the foliage is altogether that of a large flowered Clematis, the 
flowers well opened in broad rosettes, with edges scarcely raised at all, 
not recalling in any way the thick sepals, more or less urceolate, of 
C. coccinea, the preceding hybrids of which had partially retained their 
arrangement and form. Is it possible that we have here to do with’ an 
illegitimate child, and that, despite the Latin adage, the father is not 
the one the nuptials indicate? It is rash to be too sure ; so many causes 
could favour an irregularity: the wind, the insects to which some 
adventurous pollen grain had confided its fortunes. Nothing further is 
necessary. 
Other characters, however, are more encouraging, without speaking 
of the rich crimson colour of the flower, which certainly appears to be 
derived from C. coccinea: this species also appears in the form, the 
number, and the arrangement of the stamens, and above all in the 
constitution of the plant, to which it seems to have imparted its 
immunity from the terrible malady of the large flowered Clematis, and 
to have transmitted, on the other hand, its susceptibility to the oidiwm, or 
‘“‘white,”’ of the Clematis family. This last disease is in fact that against 
which it is most necessary to guard, but, as is well known, it is not difficult 
to do so. 
Besides these I know of other cases of hybridisation where the pro- 
duct is in no way intermediate between the parents, and only resembles 
one of them, without, however, making me doubt their origin at all. The 
most striking of these is that of a Peony raised by the artificial fecun- 
