14 MONOGRAPHY OF THE GENUS CAMELLIA. 



adding, doubtfully, that if the new intermediate genera can be posterially 

 united, the two first orders may form but one, for the reason that the 

 Camellia only differs from the ternstrasmia by the seed. 



In its native country, the Camellia rises to the height of from forty to 

 fifty feet J but in Europe, it rarely exceeds from twenty to twentyfive, and 

 forms a shrub of the most superb appearance, whose persisting foliage, of a 

 glossy green, and splendid flowers, place it, without contradiction, in the 

 first rank, among the plants of our green-houses. 



Its branches are numerous, alternate, diverging, reddish when young, 

 but ash-colored and striated in their adult agej the leaves uniformly alter- 

 nate, large, smooth, generally more or less convex, thick, coriaceous, of a 

 beautiful deep and brilliant green, margins acutely, but not deeply dentatedj 

 the flowers, often from two to three inches in diameter, of a bright cherry- 

 red, terminal, on rising from the axils of the leaves of the superior branches; 

 they appear, in this climate, to gladden our sight, in November and March, 

 when the frosts have desolated our gardens; this peculiarity, independently 

 of the extreme beauty, so remarkable in this plant, has been sufficient to 

 claim for it our preference; it may also be added, that if nature had not 

 refused an agreeable aroma, it would be the sovereign of plants, to which no 

 other could be compared, without disparagement. 



It has not been considered proper to describe, as a botanist, the trans- 

 formations which cultivation has produced, in the normal type, (Camellm 

 Ja-ponicaj) by the attempts to obtain so many and such elegant varieties. 

 There is no one who has paid any attention to horticulture, that is such an 

 entire stranger to the science of botany, as not to be acquainted with those 

 metamorphoses of the stamens and pistils, which constitute the semi-double, 

 double, and full flowers, that are daily produced, in our gardens, among the 

 families of the roses, dahlias and other choice plants. 



Section 2. — The Increase of the Varieties of the Camellia by CulttvatioVy 

 and the Necesisty of a Classification. 



The Camellia Japonica, as has been stated, was introduced into Europe 

 in 1739, and first ornamented the gardens of England; soon after it passed 

 into Italy, then into France, and at a much later period into Germany. This 

 was the only species known in Europe for fortyseven years; it subsequently 



