Editor's Table. 



127 



In regard to the external appearance of the book, all we can say is, that the 

 publishers have done their very best to make the outside worthy of the contents. 



Very few books intended for holiday gifts surpass this in luxuriousness of paper 

 and type, or in the dainty fitness of the illustrations. The pubHshers may well 

 regard it with pride ; and while all amateurs will, of course, buy and read it, peo- 

 ple who do not know a cabbage-rose from a cabbage can cheaply acquire a 

 floricultural reputation among their friends by embeUishing their parlor-tables 

 with a copy of " The Book of Roses." 



If such books as this are called for, they will be produced by some one or 

 another ; and the increasing demand for horticultural works is one of the pleas- 

 antest signs of the times. 



.The fact that somebody has time, in this busy land, to gratify his jesthetic 

 sentiment by the cultivation of flowers, shows that we are not all absorbed in 

 money-getting ; and no happier answer to the common charge, that all Yankees 

 are slaves of the almighty dollar, can be devised, than simply to hand to the 

 calumniator this book, or one of Mr. Rand's. 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. 



In "Chronicles of a Town Garden," published last year in "The Florist and 

 Pomologist," I read an account of Roman hyacinths as being very early spring- 

 blooming bulbs, which forced finely, and produced elegant fragrant flowers. 



Seeing the name in a Dutch catalogue, I procured some through a friend ; but 

 the bulb sent bore no resemblance to a common hyacinth. I have planted them, 

 and am giving the usual treatment of hyacinths in earth. 



Can you tell me what they are, the botanical name, and whether I am growing 

 mine properly ? A new Subscriber. 



We sent your letter to Mr. Rand ; who replies, The botanical name of the 

 bulb commonly called Roman hyacinth is Bellevalia Romana, or operctdata : 

 it is also sometimes called Scilla Roniana and Hyacinthus Roinamis. The 

 plants are distinguished from Muscari^ some species of which they much re- 

 semble, by having their perianth divided half-way down into six folded lobes, 

 expanding to form a prismatic bell. They differ from the true hyacinths by the 

 perianth having an angular and not a circular section. 



The bulbs are about the size of an English walnut, roundish-oblong, smooth, 

 somewhat resembling those of the musk hyacinth : the flowers are blue, white, 

 or pink tinged with green. They are natives of Southern Europe and Western 

 Asia. B. Syriaca has orange and blue flowers. They would not prove hardy in 

 New England, and require pot-culture like tender scillas, which they much re- 

 semble in flower. While pretty, they are not very ornamental ; and I much doubt 

 their being very early flowering. The blue is the most common, and is figured 

 in Curtis's " Botanical Magazine," tab. 939. Your treatment is right ; but they 

 will scarcely bloom before March. 



