1896.] ESSAYS. 91 



PVcnch raisers have long had a monopoly in this bnsiuess of raising 

 seedlings, and as long as they send us such as Vivi and Morel we shall 

 be grateful to them ; but to one of this stamp there are hundreds of lit- 

 tle or no value for our climate, and it is well that we have come to rely 

 upon American industry and brains to supply our wants, and incident- 

 ally those of Europe too. Last summer I took an extended tour 

 through some of the best English gardens, and enjoyed comparing 

 notes with the growers there as to the relative merits of our varieties 

 in the two countries There is a wide-spread feeling over there that 

 most of our novelties are no good, and should never have been sent 

 out. If we could ex[)ort a little of our climate with the plants, there 

 would be loss of this sort of grumbling, and more of our sorts grown 

 there. That it is the climate that is at fault I am fully convinced, for 

 do not we have the same experience with kinds that are of European 

 origin? Our summer sun is too hot, the wood is ripened too soon, or 

 even if the flowers are fairly good they do not have the texture that is 

 necessary in a good flower of the present day to enable it to stand up 

 after it is cut with long stems. Taking these facts into consideration, 

 it is well, I say, that we have good men to the front who have made it 

 a business to supply us with free-born American Chrysanthemums, 

 and those of the best quality, excelling those raised in all other 

 climes, and if we stop to think how quickly this has been accom- 

 plished it will easily be seen that it is one of the marvels of latter- 

 day Horticulture. 



While on the subject of raising seedlings let me urge those of you 

 who have the conveniences at hand to try a few seedlings each year if 

 only for amusement. If necessary to start with, buy a few seeds this 

 year and sow them in a warm greenhouse in April, and grow them 

 on without check as you would rooted cuttings ; it is most interesting 

 to watch them show buds and to see the flowers as they develop their 

 colors and gradually unfold their flowers. You may not get any that 

 are worthy of honors at the hands of the National Society, but you 

 will surely get pretty flowers, and they will be your own children. 

 The better way then to continue the work is to take two of the best 

 flowers of the kinds you wish to work upon, beginning when they 

 are fully expanded in the fall, that is, when the eye in the centre is 

 fully visible and the pollen ripe, shear oft:' the petals of the seed-bear- 

 ing flower, and apply the pollen from the other, and then carefully iso- 

 late the plant in a sunny corner of the greenhouse until the seeds are 

 ripe ; it will not take long, soon after New Year you will be able to 

 harvest the seed until sowing-time, and you will then, if the parents 



