JULY 145 



the endowment of beauty and grace. So thought 

 Spenser when he penned the lines : 



' A fairer nymph yet never saw mine eie, 

 She is the pride and primrose of the rest.' 



The largest genus of the primrose order, that of 

 Primula, contains an immense number of species, 

 chiefly natives of the mountain ranges of the northern 

 hemisphere. Strange to say, of all this multitude only 

 two species are indigenous to the British Isles, namely, 

 the common primrose (Primula veris) and the lovely 

 birdseye (P. farinosa). The common primrose is ex- 

 cessively variable, and at one time botanists inclined to 

 dissent from Linnaeus, who beheld in the primrose, 

 the cowslip, and the oxlip no more than three racial 

 varieties of a single species; but in this matter Bentham 

 has vindicated the wonderful intuition of Linnaeus in 

 all questions of affinity, and pointed out that, although 

 the primrose seems to be fitted with a separate foot- 

 stalk for every blossom, these footstalks really spring 

 from a common subterranean stem, which, in the cow- 

 slip, oxlip, and polyanthus rises above ground to carry 

 a bunch of flowers. Primroses, cowslips, and oxlips, 

 therefore, in all their varieties, should be regarded as 

 constituting a single species, the oxlip representing a 

 form intermediate between the extremes of habit. 



This species has sported into innumerable garden 

 forms, single and double, of many hues. The latest 

 addition to the colour scheme is a veritable blue prim- 

 rose, the achievement of the late Mr. G. F. Wilson, who 

 created that remarkable champ fleuri at Wisley, now 

 K 



