268 



Plant-Breeding 



that they have recently been named as a garden group- 

 species, Chrysanthemum hortorum (Stand. Cyc. Hort. ii. 

 755) . These plants now comprise forms single and double ; 

 pompon and giant ; discoid, flat-rayed, and quilled ; ball- 

 head and reflexed ; hairy-rayed ; a wide range of colors ; 

 bizarre forms ; and marked differences in stature and habit 

 of plant. If one were to bring together the little pompons, 



the hardy border types, the 

 anemone-flowered, the Japanese 

 incurved, and the slender singles, 

 he would have difficulty in refer- 

 ring them to any single origin. 



And yet the records show that 

 these multitudes .of forms have 

 come from one oriental feral 

 group, or what some botanists re- 

 gard as two very similar species. 

 The original was introduced to 

 England about 150 years ago. 

 In 1796 the Botanical Magazine figured an important large- 

 flowered departure, marking the beginning, or practically 

 the beginning, of the modern record and development. 

 The plants may have been long cultivated and consider- 

 ably modified in China and Japan. What are considered 

 to be the feral forms have been introduced within very 

 recent years. They are most unpromising looking herbs, 

 one (C. morifolium) with white rays, and the other (C. 

 indicum) with yellow rays. They look no more promising 

 than many weedy composites of the fields ; and yet some 

 process has evolved a multitude of astonishing forms 

 without our knowing how or why even though the evolu- 



FIG. 78. Japanese type. 



