238 Select Suburban Residences. 



in full bloom ; and, what rather surprised us, half a dozen fine 

 specimens of that gay and very scarce plant Lalage ornata, a 

 genus of which only one more species is known to botanists. 

 Seeds of this lalage were brought over from Australia to Mr. 

 Knight, by the late Mr. Baxter, in 1829; and, under Mr. 

 Knight's superior management, it was flowered in 1833 or 1834, 

 and afterwards figured in the Botanic Register. It was found to be 

 so difficult to propagate, that fears were entertained of its being 

 lost to the country altogether. We heard nothing of it for the 

 last three or four years, and thought it was really lost. Mr. 

 Beaton tells us the original plant is still in the Exotic Nursery, 

 where plants of it may be had, and also at Clapton, and probably 

 in some other nurseries. 



" Along the front stage in the green-house we noticed a collec- 

 tion of new Australian seedlings. Some of these were raised 

 here; the rest is the cream of the large collection raised last 

 year in the Clapton Nursery, from seeds sent to Mr. Low : these 

 were received in exchange for a beautiful corrasa, raised by 

 Mr. Beaton at Haffield. (See our preceding Volume, p. 94.) 

 This corrsea Mr. Low thinks far superior to any of the new 

 seedlings ; and we believe a figure of it will soon appear in 

 Paxton's Magazine of Botany. There are many other cross 

 seedlings of corrseas and other plants in progress here, which, 

 as soon as they are proved, will soon find their way into other 

 collections. Mr. Beaton has been for many years trying to 

 prove Mr. Knight's theory of vegetable superfretation, and pro- 

 mises (p. 161.) to send us an account of his failures. But he 

 says, on reviewing his notes, he finds the action of the pollen in 

 some instances so very different from what it is generally believed 

 to be, that he shall put off saying anything on the subject till he 

 sees how far this difference takes place in different genera or fa- 

 milies. Our readers will recollect what Mr. Beaton wrote on the 

 crossing of fuchsias in a former volume. We here saw what 

 Mr. Beaton calls the most curious cross yet obtained among the 

 fuchsias : it is a seedling from F. arborescens fecundated by the 

 pollen of F. excorticata. It is nearly four years old, and has 

 shown no disposition to flower. The parent plant is upwards of 

 12 ft. high, and beautifully branched. Mr. Beaton dusted many 

 thousand flowers of F. arborescens with the pollen of different 

 fuchsias, and raised many thousand seedlings from plants so 

 dusted for several successive years; but this single instance is 

 the only deviation he found from the arborescens. When this 

 cross and the other splendid crosses from the F. fulgens will 

 come to interbreed, they will raise the character of this favourite 

 family far beyond what we have any conception of now. 



" The many importations of orchidaceous plants, from Mexico 

 and the north-east parts of South America, have filled the 



