GREENHOUSE RHODODENDRONS 



forms, many, from a horticultural standpoint, exceed the original species in 

 brilliant and varied colours, large size of truss and individual blooms, compact 

 habit of growth, and the ease with which they can be cultivated. 



A classic paper by Professor Henslow, on the Hybrid Rhododendrons raised in 

 the Veitchian houses, read before the Royal Horticultural Society and afterwards 

 printed in the Journal, vol. xiii. pt. ii. (1891), contains a full account of the various 

 hybrids, with their genealogies, and the various phenomena exhibited by them 

 as the result of cross-breeding and hybridizing. To this paper we are largely 

 indebted for much of the following information. 



With regard to the colours of the flowers of the original species, Professor 

 Henslow remarks : " They are all reducible to two, yellow and rose-red. The 

 former is produced by the presence of yellow granules scattered within the cells 

 of the epidermis or underlying tissue, while the reds are due to various degrees of 

 concentration of the coloured fluid, both in individual cells, as well as by super- 

 position of cells containing the rose-coloured fluid. The buffs or orange-colours 

 are due to combinations of the pink fluid with yellow granules, either in the same 

 cell, as occurs in some epidermides, or in adjacent cells, as occurs in orange- 

 coloured anthers examined. If there be a pink throat with a yellow or orange 

 border to the corolla, this is due to the epidermal cells containing a more 

 concentrated solution of the pink fluid." 



"The first hybrid raised was named Princess Royal, the product of a cross 

 between R. jasminiflorum (white) and R. javanicum (yellow), and the result is 

 remarkable. The flowers of Princess Royal show no trace of yellow, but are of a 

 delicate pink or rose colour. Another hybrid produced later from the same cross, 

 named jasminiflorum carminatum, resembles Princess Royal in all but colour, 

 which approaches crimson. By combining Princess Royal (pink) with one of its 

 parents (jasminiflorum, white) a white-flowered variety was produced, which 

 received the name of Princess Alexandra." 



"The dissociation of colours by crossing, in other plants, may give rise to a 

 striped, flamed, or blotched appearance, as in Calceolaria, and in some varieties 

 of the Snapdragon : but this has never occurred in these Rhododendrons. Some- 

 times, however, the flower has the interior of the tube or throat of a more strongly 

 tinged hue than the lobes, and vice versa" 



Our employe, the late George Taylor, accomplished much with the species of 

 this genus, and raised several excellent varieties. His first success, named 

 * Duchess of Edinburgh, a scarlet-flowered hybrid from Rhododendron Lobbii 

 crossed with R. Brookeanum, was exhibited at the Royal Horticultural Society's 

 meeting in March 1874, and distributed in 1877, in which year it was figured and 

 described in Messrs. Veitchs' Plant Catalogue. A seedling, named in compliment 

 to its raiser t Taylori, was sent out the same year, a pink-flowered variety of the 

 third generation, the parents Princess Alexandra (white) and Rhododendron 

 Brookeanum, a Bornean species with bright yellow flowers. 



In 1879 two new varieties were distributed, named respectively Duchess of 

 J Teck and Prince Leopold. The first resulted from crossing Princess Royal 

 with Rhododendron Brookeanum, and produced flowers of a light buff-yellow, 



* Fl. and Pom. 1874, p. 145, col. pi. 



f Veitchs' Catlg. of PI. 1877, p. 19, tig. ; Fl. Mag. 1877, pi. 242. 



J Veitchs' Catlg. of PL 1879. Fl. and Pom. 1876, p. 145. 



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