Caryophyllecz Dianthus. 63 



etc. It is a native of the Mediterranean region, but it has be- 

 come naturalized in many localities farther north. According 

 to some authors, the Carnation was cultivated in very ancient 

 times by the Mussulmans of Africa, who used it to perfume 

 their liqueurs, and was brought from Tunis during the lattei 

 half of the thirteenth century, upon the termination of the 

 disastrous expedition undertaken by St. Louis against that 

 town. But there is nothing to prove that it is any more in- 

 digenous in Barbary than it is on* the northern shores of the 

 Mediterranean. Moreover, the history of this plant is neither 

 more nor less obscure than that of many other cultivated plants 

 of early introduction. Under cultivation the normally single 

 flower has become semi-double or double in all degrees, and, in 

 place of the uniform lilac purple of the wild state, it has as- 

 sumed all hues, from pure white to dark purple and almost 

 black, and even some which seem quite foreign to it, as yellow 

 and certain slate-coloured tints, in which some profess to dis- 

 tinguish shades of blue. These colours are varied and inter- 

 mixed in a thousand ways upon a ground of the dominating 

 tint, giving rise to striped, flaked, spotted, bordered, bi- or tri- 

 coloured double or full flowers, with petals fringed or entire, 

 realising almost every imaginable combination of form and 

 colour. 



Every country of Europe, but principally Holland, Belgium, 

 Germany, France, and England, has participated in the culti- 

 vation of the Carnation, and each of these countries has pro- 

 duced a series of varieties, more or less distinct, which they 

 have attempted to classify systematically ; but these classifica- 

 tions, made without any common understanding, and resting 

 almost all of them upon the whims of some amateurs, have 

 augmented rather than diminished the confusion. We think 

 we cannot do better than give an outline of those classifications 

 which have received the greatest number of adherents in this 

 branch of floriculture. According to the English classification, 

 all the varieties of the Carnation are brought under three 

 categories, viz. : Bizarres, Flakes and Picotees. The Bizarres 

 are distinguished by their white ground, rayed or striped from 

 the centre to the circumference, with bands of two or three 

 clearly defined different colours or different tints of the same 

 colour. The Flakes have also a white ground, but they are 

 only striped or streaked with one colour. And Picotees, instead 

 of having the petals longitudinally striped, have them bordered 



