CARNATIONS GROWN AT HOME. 167 



but two seasons, interrupted by a winter season of rest, after 

 which their usefulness is gone. 



I now suppose we are going to grow a few carnations for 

 self-gratification and home adornment. A supply must be obtain- 

 ed, and there are only two ways to do so; one to buy a package of 

 carnation seeds and germinate them. This is not practical. The 

 seed is expensive whether home-grown or imported. A good va- 

 riety will cost fifty cents a package, or about a penny a seed. The 

 germination of these seeds is difficult under such conditions as 

 exist about a cottage home. The plants at first are delicate and 

 easily destroyed, and it takes all of the first season, if you are suc- 

 cessful with your seed, to grow the plants to the blooming stage; 

 then they have to be carried through the winter in the bay win- 

 dow or a fight cellar, for planting out in the spring. 



But after all this trouble, there is still a more serious trouble. 

 Carnations do not come true from seed. You have no possible 

 means of knowing what color you are going to get, or whether 

 your crop of flowers will possess any merit at all, as compared 

 with the fine varieties now in cultivation. Many of your seed- 

 lings will have single flowers, no matter how much they cost, or 

 how fine a strain they are claimed to be. 



It is estimated that florists grow 10,000 seedlings annually, 

 and out of this vast number there are not, on an average, over ten 

 new carnations a year put upon the market as beiny; better than, 

 or as good as existing kinds. If you purpose to grow a few car- 

 nations, you want good ones. You must now see there is no hope 

 of obtaining them from seed. 



Your next and only source of first supply is from some pro- 

 fessional carnation grower. When a fine carnation is obtained 

 from seed, the variety is perpetuated by cuttings. Large carna- 

 tion growers thus continue the kinds by the tens of thousands. 

 They then know in advance the color and character of the flower 

 they desire to have, and are familiar with the habits and peculi- 

 arities of the plants they obtain. 



There are seven primary divisions of colors in carnations, 

 suggested by the writer, twenty years ago, and now generally ac- 



