Flowers and Gardens 



fantastic and beautiful alike, yet all of the 

 truest workmanship. He takes them just 

 as he finds them, blended together just as 

 God saw fit that they should grow. The 

 feelings of a man like this may possibly be 

 cold, but it is hardly likely that they should 

 be radically false. But does not the 

 botanist prefer the single flower because 

 in the double the natural connections are 

 undistinguishable ? No doubt that he 

 does. For this is no barren mechanical 

 question. It means not only that we can- 

 not number the stamens and pistils in a 

 double flower, but that nearly all which 

 distinguished it from other flowers is gone. 

 So legibly is relationship written upon the 

 features that the practised botanist can 

 generally guess a strange plant's family 

 (natural order) at a glance, petal, stamen, 

 and every other part being in some degree 

 characteristic ; but in double flowers he 

 knows little except from the calyx or the 

 herbage, or something that is left unal- 

 tered. Now, of course, the beauty is 

 degraded in proportion to this loss of 

 character. 



NOTE i 



A highly cultivated Pansy or Geranium 

 of necessity loses much of its original 

 164 



