892 FLOWERS. Chap. X. 



man, energetically commenced their culture ; and in the course of 

 a few years twenty varieties could be jjurchased.^*^ At about the 

 same period, namely in 1813 or 1814, Lord Gambier collected some 

 wild plants, and his gardener, Mr. Thomson, cultivated them, 

 together with some common garden varieties, and soon effected a 

 great improvement. The first great change was the conversion of 

 the dark lines in the centre of tlie flower into a dark eye or centre, 

 which at that period had never been seen, but is now considered 

 one of the chief requisites of a first-rate flower. In 1835 a book 

 entirely devoted to this flower was published, and four hundred 

 named varieties were on sale. From these circumstances this plant 

 seemed to me worth studying, more especially from the great 

 contrast between the small, dull, elongated, irregTilar flowers of the 

 wild pansy, and the beautiful, flat, symmetrical, circular, velvet- 

 like flowers, more than two inches in diameter, magnificently and 

 variously coloured, which are exhibited at our shows. But when I 

 came to enquire more closely, I found that, though the varieties 

 were so modern, yet that much confusion and doubt prevailed 

 about their parentage. Florists believe that the varieties^** are 

 descended from several wild stocks, namely, V. tricolor, lutea, 

 (jiandiflora, amwna, and altaica, more or less intercrossed. And 

 when I looked to botanical works to ascertain whether these forms 

 ought to be ranked as species, I foiand equal doubt and confusion, 

 Viula altaica seems to be a distinct form, but what part it has played 

 in the origin of our varieties I know not ; it is said to have been 

 crossed with V. lutea. Vi"Ia amoena'^^" is now looked at by all 

 botanists as a natural variety of V. grandiflora ; and this and V. 

 sv letica have been proved to be identical with V. lutea. The latter 

 and V. tricolor (including its admitted variety V. arvevsis) are 

 ranked as distinct species by Babington, and likewise by M. Gay,^*" 

 who has paid particular attention to the genus; but the specific 

 distinction between V. lutta and tricolor is chiefly grounded on the 

 one being strictly and the other not strictly perennial, as well as on 

 some other slight and unimportant difl'erences in the form of the 

 stem and stipules. Bentham unites these two forms ; and a high 

 authority on such matters, Mr. H. C. Watson,'*^ says that, " while 

 V. tricolor passes into V. arvensis on the one side, it approximates 

 so much towards V. lutea and V. Curtisii on the other side, that a 

 distinction becomes scarcely more easy between them." 

 Eence, after having carefully compared numerous varieties, I 



"' Loudon's ' Gardener's Magazine,' '*^ Quoted from ' Annales des Sci- 



vol. xi. 1835, p. 427 ; also ' Journal ences,' in the Companion to the ' Bot, 



of Horticulture,' April 14, 1863, p. Mag.,' vol. i. 1835, p. 159. 



275. , '8' ' Cybele Britannica,' vol. i. p. 



'*^ Loudon's ' Gardener's Magazine,' 173. See also Dr. Herbert on the 



vol. viii. p. 575 : vol. ix. p. 689. changes of colour in transplanted spe- 



'*^ Sir J. E. Smith. ' English Flora,' cimens, and on the natural variations 



vol. 1. p. 306. H. C. Watson, ' Cybele ot V. grandiflora, in ' Transact. Hort. 



Britannica,' vol. i. 1847, p. 181. &oc.' vol. iv. p. 19. 



