CHAPTER X 

 PERPETUAL-FLOWERING CARNATIONS 



BY THOMAS H. COOK, F.R.H.S. 



To France belongs the honour of having, some sixty-seven 

 years ago, raised the present type of Carnation which is 

 distinct from all others in its habit of perpetual flowering. 

 Mons. Dalmais and Mons. Schmidt, of Lyons, were the 

 pioneer raisers of this race, which was obtained from the 

 remontant or monthly Carnation crossed with the Flemish 

 Carnation, the offspring of these in turn being carefully 

 selected and recrossed with each other about twenty years 

 later by Mons. AlegatieYe, also of Lyons, who distributed 

 what were then called the Tree Carnations. There is reason 

 for supposing that tree Carnations were cultivated in France 

 nearly one hundred years earlier, but it is to the more 

 recent date that we must ascribe that development which 

 has played the most important part in the spread and 

 popularity of the Perpetual-Flowering Carnation. 



About the year 1852 the old tree Carnations engaged 

 the attention of American floriculturists, and a French 

 florist of New York, named Mons. Marc, raised several 

 seedlings of the remontant type, from seed sent from 

 France. At a later date Messrs. Dailledouze, Zeller, and 

 Gard secured seed from the same source, from which 

 they raised the first American plants. During the next 



twenty years, enterprising horticulturists in various parts 



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