35 2 GENERAL REVIEW. 



done, and are still doing, much to improve this, one of the 

 finest of all autumnal flowers, and their new seedlings may be 

 seen every season at the different metropolitan exhibitions. 



The late Mr John Standish raised several very distinct kinds 

 of seedling Gladioli, one of which was exhibited in 1871 under 

 the- name of "Alice Wilson," and figured in the 'Florist,' 1873, 

 p. 73. The flower is rather small, creamy-white, edged with 

 bright rose, the shape of the flower being open and regular, more 

 like a Lily than a Gladiolus. It was one of a batch raised be- 

 tween G. brenchleyensis (raised by the late Mr Hooker of the 

 Brenchley Nursery about thirty ago its colour is a vivid 

 scarlet) and G. cruentus (see 'Florist,' 1869, p. 121). 



M. Max Leichtlin of Baden-Baden, a well-known scientific 

 horticulturist, especially noted for his intelligent culture of 

 Lilies, Irids, and other bulbs, thus writes on the improvement 

 of Gladioli in the 'Garden,' vol. vii. (1875) P- 3 2 4 : "When a 

 certain race of hybrid plants is crossed and recrossed with its 

 own varieties, the production of striking novelties becomes 

 every year more difficult, until at last only one among many 

 thousands is worth keeping, and that one is frequently but little 

 better than others already in cultivation. We have nearly arrived 

 at this point with Gladioli. The only way, so far as I can see, 

 by which we can raise new and striking varieties, is to introduce, 

 so to speak, new blood. Why not try some of those old and 

 nearly forgotten species which were figured in the ' Botanical 

 Magazine' some thirty Or forty years ago? Why not try to 

 obtain crosses between the Ghent varieties (G. gandavensis) 

 and some robust species of recent introduction. It would not 

 matter if kinds with a somewhat weaker constitution than that 

 of gandavensis were used, for Nature likes to play her own part; 

 and by crossing worn-out varieties with a fragile new species, 

 the offspring is sometimes better and stronger than either of its 

 parents. I do not advance any new theory ; on the contrary, 

 proofs of the correctness of my views are abundant, and within 

 a year or two I hope to introduce to notice a new race of 

 Gladioli of more graceful habit than those we now possess, and 

 with flowers of different shapes and much larger than those of 

 the gandavensis section, several of these flowers measuring as 

 much as five inches across. This hint may be of service to 

 Gladiolus raisers." 



Among the old species above alluded to as being figured in 

 the earlier numbers of the ' Botanical Magazine,' the following 

 deserve the attention of hybridisers, together with G. Saundersii, 

 G. purpureo-auratus, and other showy species of more modern 

 introduction : G. versicolor, t. 1042 ; G. angustus, t. 602 ; G. 



