U20 



The Weekly Florists^ Review* 



Apbil 13, 1900. 



late date and plenty of fine, bright 

 vreather. As a decorative plant, the 

 Boston fern or Piersoni or Scottii is 

 sure to lead over palms, pandanuses, 

 dracaenas or rubbers. 



The public has learned what glorious 

 house plants these nephrolepises are, and 

 you should be well supplied with fine, 

 moderate-sized plants. A great many 

 cut lilies are sold at Easter for differ- 

 ent purposes, and if you have any that 

 you think will not keep until Easter 

 Sunday, cut them and put the stems in 

 water in a cool, dark place. They will 

 keep longer than on the plants. 



It seems almost impossible to expect 

 cold weather, but there is no certainty 

 of anything. For a warm, calm, if not 

 bright day, let us fervently hope. 



William Scott. 



CREDIT WHERE DUE. 



Some men seem never ready to give 

 credit where credit is due. And this 

 seems particularly true with regard to 

 the grower in his relations with his com- 

 mission man. A great many growers 

 seem disposed to regard the commission 

 house as a necessary evil instead of as 

 one of the greatest factors in building 

 up the cut flower industry to the huge 

 proportions it has now attained. 



Two growers near Chicago were over- 

 heard, the other day, discussing their ex- 

 periences with commission men. One of 

 them ships to BJank, and this was a 

 scrap of the conversation: 



"Every few days Blank's boy comes 

 chasing out to my place along in the 

 afternoon and wants a thousand carna- 

 tions. ' ' 



"And do you let him have them?" 



"Yea-s-s," slowly, as if doubtful of 

 the propriety of his action. 



Great Jehoshophat! Does he let him 

 have themt Doesn't he know that if, at 

 any time in the last month. Blank hap- 

 pened to be sold out when a late order 

 came in, all he had to do was to run 

 into Smith's next door and get what he 

 wanted at a price which would, to say 

 the least, pay him commission t Doesn't 

 he think hard enough to realize that 

 Blank is going to considerable trouble 

 purely for the good of the grower? 

 Did it never occur to him that Blank 

 had an order and wanted his grower to 

 have the advantage of it, not knowing 

 what he could do with the stock when it 

 came into the house with all the other 

 consignments of the next morning? 

 Fortunate is the grower, in these days of 

 large production and job lot sales of the 

 surplus, who is located where his com- 

 mission man can get at him in case 

 of a call at the close of the day's busi- 

 ness. 



It is quite a common thing for Chi- 

 cago wholesalers, and those of other 

 cities, to send to the greenhouses when- 

 ever possible, instead of buying of each 

 other, as they used to do in the days 

 when the supply was no greater than 

 the legitimate demand. Is it a favor to 

 let them have the stock? Well, hardly! 

 The shoe is on the other foot. 



TOEONTO, Ont. — J. H. Dunlop is build- 

 ing three houses 25x240 and rebuilding 

 several others. 



Lowell, Mass. — Harvey B. Greene is 

 beginning his second five-year term as 

 park commission*. C. A. Whittet is 

 superintendent. 



THE DAHLIA, PAST AND PRESENT. 



[A paper by W. W. Wllmore, read before 

 the Ckjiorado Society of Floriculturists at Den- 

 ver, March 24, 190S.] 



History of the Dahlia. 



This most useful and popular flower, 

 the dahlia, derives its name from the 

 Swedish botanist. Dr. Dahl, but for a 

 time was also known under the name of 

 georgina, after Prof. George, of St. 

 Petersburg. 



Its earliest known history is not yet 

 very old. About the year 1657 Francisco 

 Hernandez, a Spanish* physician, wrote 

 a book on plants, and among the plants 

 described he mentions Dahlia variabilis, 

 the species from which most, if not all, 

 of our present varieties have originated. 

 At that time it is probable that it was 

 only known as one of the great multitude 

 of botanical plants, without much, if 

 any, thought of its future usefulness, 

 for we find nothing further in print for 

 130 years. It is quite probable, however, 

 that some effort was made to improve 

 and domesticate the plant toward the 

 close of the eighteenth century, for in 

 1787 a Frenchman published an account 

 of the dahlias he had seen growing in 

 gardens in Mexico. Two years later, 

 1789, seeds were sent from the Botanic 

 Gardens of Mexico to the Eoyal Gar- 

 dens at Madrid, Spain, where it was 

 given its present name. This lot of seed- 

 lings was lost two years later, as were 

 several other lots sent to various places. 

 But their stay, though brief, awakened 

 a deep interest in the plant and its pos- 

 sibilities, and further attempts at its 

 cultivation were now made in several Eu- 

 ropean countries and it soon became 

 quite popular. The work bestowed upon 



it, however, seems to have been more in 

 the nature of a fad rather than intelli- 

 gent study. Difficulty seems to have 

 been encountered also in knowing how 

 to keep the roots over to the next sea- 

 son. 



It should be borne in mind that up to 

 this time all the varieties were single, 

 the variegated and striped varieties lead- 

 ing in popular favor. 



_The history of the first double forms 

 is told as follows: M. Donkelaar, of 

 Louvain, began a series of experiments 

 with northern-grown seed in 1812. His 

 first crop of seedlings was still quite 

 single, but seed saved from these gave 

 him some semi-double flowers in 1813, 

 and seed saved from these again gave 

 fully double flowers in 1814, the third 

 generation of the northern-grown seed. 

 These varieties continued to produce 

 double flowers and the dahlia now be- 

 came immensely popular. 



The question naturally arises here: 

 Why should northem-^rown seed produce 

 double flowers? A theory gives this 

 answer: Nature, always alert to per- 

 petuate itself, throws out extra petals 

 to protect the tender seeds from the chill 

 of the northern atmosphere. Be this 

 true or not, certain it is that double va- 

 rieties show a decided tendency in warm 

 climates to become semi-double and sin- 

 gle varieties in the north are hard to 

 keep in true form. 



Is of Easy Culture. 



The dahlia possesses a happy, easy- 

 going disposition and seems to be at 

 home in almost every country, location 

 and soil. I have customers variously 

 situated from a few feet above sea level 

 to an altitude of 8,500 feet, some on 



White Azalea Niobe with Li^ht Green Porto Rican Mat. 



(Porto Blcan Matting 1b by no means a novelty and Is not so much used as It was a couple of years 

 ago, but with an Azalea there Is nothing better.) 



