IMPROVEMENT OF GARDEN FLOWERS 99 



In some, of course, it would be difficult to say whether 

 a plant would be the better or the worse for being 

 doubled. Wherever there is a doubt it would be wise 

 not to double it. There are so many other ways in 

 which plants can be developed with a certainty of 

 improvement. They can usually be made more vigor- 

 ous; their colour can often be made brighter and 

 purer. In some cases their habit is the better for being 

 more compact. Thus some of the hybrid Larkspurs 

 are finer plants in all respects than any of the species. 

 The new garden varieties of Phlox decussata are in- 

 finitely superior in colour to any of the older ones; 

 some of the hybrid Pentstemons have a beauty and 

 variety of colour and a vigour of growth far beyond 

 any to be found in the species from which they have 

 been produced; and the Tufted Pansies or Violas as 

 they are commonly called, have both combined and 

 improved out of all knowledge all the good qualities of 

 Viola tricolor and Viola cornuta, which were their far 

 distant wild ancestors. But in all these cases there has 

 been no attempt to pervert or to conceal the natural 

 character of the plants. The flowers may have been 

 enlarged, but not so that their stalks cannot support 

 them. The habit may have been made more compact, 

 but it has not, except, perhaps, in a few Phloxes, been 

 dwarfed into deformity. 



The eye may be trained in its appreciation of flowers, 

 as of most other beautiful things; but it must be 

 trained on a principle; and the only sure principle is 

 that every plant be always considered as a whole, and 



