History and Culture of the Carnation. 1.29 



their various species and varieties. No genus, except, per- 

 haps, that of roses, has been so httle understood, or so inac- 

 curately described, by our earliest writers ; and this obscurity 

 does not seem to have arisen, as in the geranium tribe, from 

 a casual intermixture of the species, either in a wild or culti- 

 vated state ; nor from the great number of the species, as in 

 the genus i?6sa, very nearly resembling each other ; nor from 

 the great difficulty of defining, by methodical characters, 

 their specific differences ; but the principal source of confu- 

 sion has been occasioned by the hicorrect attention of early 

 writers to a just discrimination of the respective species, and 

 their almost infinite varieties. 



Gesner and Csesalpinus, by their genius, first dispelled this 

 cloud of ignorance ; while the scrupulous fidelity and accu- 

 racy of the botanical figures of Clusius marked with precision 

 the line of discrimination, and settled, with a more faithful 

 delineation, the distinction of the species both of this and of 

 many other genera. Parkinson, in his Paradlsiis, published 

 in 1629, has given figures, and a particular account, of such 

 carnations as were cultivated in his time. He divides them 

 into two sorts, large and small : to the former he gives the 

 name of carnations; and to the latter, gilloflowers. He sup- 

 poses the old name of gilloflower to be corrupted from July- 

 flower ; and Rea, in his Flora^ has adopted the same idea. 

 But in this respect they are both mistaken ; for the name is 

 evidently derived from the French word girofle^ a clove, from 

 the smell of the flower resembling that of a clove. 



Many of the celebrated varieties of the carnation, in o-reat 

 esteem in former times, are figured in Parkinson's Paradhiis, 

 in Besler's Hortus Ei/stettensis, in Swcrtiiis's Florilegium, and in 

 several other celebrated authors of that time. Rea, in his 

 Tlbra^ published in 1676, gives a catalogue of 360 good sorts 

 of carnations. Parkinson recites 19 principal sorts of car- 

 nation and 30 varieties of gilloflowers. Gerarde informs us 

 that the yellow or orange tawny gilloflower, which had then 

 been but lately introduced, and at this time is in little esteem, 

 had been procured from Poland by Master Nicholas Lete, a 

 worshipful merchant of London; who gave it to him for his 

 garden near London, situated on the spot where Holborn 

 now stands; and which flower, before that time, was never 

 seen or heard of in these countries. 



Although the catalogue given by Parkinson has been sup- 

 planted by modern flowers, and new ones are continually pro- 

 duced by the indefatigable florists of the present time in con- 

 siderable numbers, one gardener in the Vale of Evesham havino- 

 raised this season upwards of 2000 seedlings ; it may not be 



