18 STUDIES IN GARDENING 



doing so call it Zauschneria California, the nursery- 

 man will know at once what you mean; whereas, if 

 you call it California Fuchsia, or humming-bird flower, 

 two praiseworthy attempts at an English name, he 

 is pretty sure not to take your meaning. The object 

 of botanical names is scientific precision, which they 

 certainly provide; and so where scientific precision is 

 needed they are usually indispensable. But, for all 

 that, the want of beautiful English names to many 

 beautiful flowers seems a reproach to their beauty, 

 and to stamp them as aliens and not true citizens of 

 our gardens. And the question is, How are we to find 

 beautiful English names for them? The multitude 

 of modern discoveries would make it difficult to keep 

 pace with them, even if we tried; and we certainly 

 do not try very hard. But it must be remembered 

 that the beautiful old names probably took hundreds 

 of years to grow, like other words. They were some- 

 times corruptions of French and Latin names, the 

 corruption no doubt maintaining itself because of 

 some appropriate beauty in its sound or some sug- 

 gestion of a new meaning. Gillyflower, for instance, 

 is said to have been derived from Caryophyllus, 

 Dianthus caryophyllus being the specific name of 

 the carnation, or rather of the pink, from which the 

 carnation has been developed. Gillyflower is a pretty- 

 sounding word, but it has no particular meaning. 

 In the seventeenth century, however, an attempt 

 was made to corrupt the name further into July- 

 flower because the carnation flowers in July. But 



