June 3, 1896.] 



Garden and Forest. 



223 



The hemlock industry has indirectly helped farming in 

 this region, for it has created a home market for many of 

 the farmers' small products. In the bark-peeling season 

 there are thousands who come to the woods who buy their 

 butter, eggs, cheese, fresh fruits and vegetables direct from 

 the surrounding farmers. Many farmers who owned Hem- 

 lock tracts sold them to the tanneries for good prices, and 

 others merely sold the trees on the land, and had the 

 pleasure of seeing their farms cleaned of the trees. It is true 

 that the stumps remained, but these were burnt or rooted 

 out by degrees. More than this, a few of the farmers, see- 

 ing the great inroads made into the forests, cultivated the 

 young Hemlock saplings and even planted others, and in 

 time there may be a new industry for them in forest-plant- 

 ing. In the winter season the hemlock-bark has to be 

 carted to the tanneries, and the local farmers find that they 

 can take their teams into the woods and make good wages 

 in a season of the year when farm-work is at a standstill. 

 Many a farmer has made enough cash in this way to pay 

 off mortgages and buy new machinery for his work. 



The tanners have naturally made the most profits out of 

 the woods. This is no more than any one could expect, 

 as they invested the capital and did most of the head-work. 

 The price paid by them for the bark has run all the way 

 from $3.00 to $6.00 per cord, but never more than the latter 

 figure, and thousands of cords have been sold by them all 

 the way from $10.00 to $15.00 per cord. At present, how- 

 ever, there is less profit in the business, and old prices may 

 never return again. 



New York. (jr. JL. W. 



Foreign Correspondence 



Tulips. 



MR. J. G. BAKER, F.R.S., lectured at the last meeting 

 of the Royal Horticultural Society on the genus 

 Tulipa, the botany of which has been a special study with 

 him for many years. A large collection of the flowers of 

 Tulips, representing both species and garden varieties, was 

 sent to the meeting from Kew, Messrs. Barr & Sons, Messrs. 

 J. Veitch & Sons and others. The time was in every sense 

 propitious, Tulips generally being at their very best, and 

 the display made by them in public and other gardens this 

 year being very much greater than anything, perhaps, ever 

 seen before in the neighborhood of London, at any rate. 

 The every-day, somewhat gaudy Tulips of the Dutch gar- 

 dens are being gradually supplanted here by more beauti- 

 ful sorts. English Tulips and their sisters, the Darwin 

 Tulips, are finding general favor. The botanical varieties 

 and many of the species or subspecies are also becoming 

 favorites in horticulture. English nurserymen are now 

 growing them largely, for the Tulip is quite at home under 

 the conditions afforded in most parts of England. The 

 display it makes is of fairly long duration, and the charm 

 of the best flowers is equal to anything we get from hardy 

 spring flowers. 



Mr. Baker admits about one hundred distinct botanical 

 species, some of these being, perhaps, only subspecies, in 

 a broad sense. When he monographed them about twenty 

 years ago there were only forty-eight, but since then about 

 fifty additions have been made, chiefly by Russian col- 

 lectors. This accounts for the unattractive names many of 

 them bear, such as Kolpokowskiana, Kesselringii, Kauf- 

 manniana, Ostrowskyana, etc. About fifty species are culti- 

 vated in the Royal Gardens, in addition to a large number 

 of the named varieties, and for the past three weeks or so 

 they have been a magnificent feature. 



The genus is limited in its distribution to the north tem- 

 perate regions of the Old World, being concentrated in 

 central China. It is represented in North America by the 

 nearly allied Calochortus ; these two genera, Calochortus 

 and Tulipa, together having the same distribution as Lilium. 



The genus Tulipa is divided into two sections, namely, 

 Eutulipa, the true Tulips, and Orithyia, the latter being 

 characterized by a short style, the true Tulips having the 



stigma sessile on the top of the ovary. The Orithyias are 

 only of botanical interest, T. sylvestris, the little yellow- 

 flowered native, being the only one met with in gardens. 

 The characters relied upon to distinguish the species are in 

 the bulbs as well as in the flowers, so that botanists are 

 sometimes at a loss when asked to determine the species 

 from flowers and leaves alone. Most of the big-flowered 

 handsome garden Tulips belong to the group represented 

 by T Gesneriana, of which an enormous number of forms 

 are known, some wild, some of garden origin. This spe- 

 cies has been a favorite garden flower for over two hundred 

 years, all the old Tulips, out of which what is known as 

 the Tulip mania had its origin, being forms of T. Gesneri- 

 ana. Mr. Baker is inclined to look upon such so-called 

 species as T. Ostrowskyana, T Batalini and T. Schrankii 

 as wild forms of this ancient, polymorphic plant. 



What are known as English or Breeder Tulips are se- 

 lected forms of T. Gesneriana, in which the petals are 

 unicolored, save a large eyelike blotch of yellow or white 

 at the base of the cup. The value of the variety in the 

 eyes of a Tulip fancier depends upon the clearness and 

 regularity of this eye and the uniformity of the shade or 

 color of the rest of the flower. It is remarkable that the 

 Darwin Tulips, the beauty of which is now generally ad- 

 mitted, are practically sorts which were discarded by the 

 breeder because of the intensity or heaviness of their color 

 and the blue-black eye at the base of the cup. They are, 

 too, stronger and taller in scape than the English Tulip. 

 Of their beauty it is, in my opinion, impossible to speak too 

 highly. Messrs. Barr & Sons have about ten thousand of 

 them in flower in their Tooting nursery, the collection ex- 

 hibited by them last week being greatly admired. It is 

 due to Messrs. Krelage & Sons, the Haarlem nurserymen, 

 that they should be credited with the discovery and distri- 

 bution of this fine section of garden Tulips. Of the many 

 sorts in flower at Kew these Darwin Tulips are the most 

 admired. Messrs. Barr have sorted them into about twenty 

 colors and named them, but at Kew they are all mixed 

 indiscriminately in a large bed on a lawn, where they pro- 

 duce a rich kaleidoscopic effect. 



Breeder tulips are peculiar in their habit of changing 

 color, "rectifying,'' as the fanciers term it, after a time. 

 There does not appear to be any cause, time or season for 

 this change ; it may happen when the bulb is six years old 

 or not till it is sixty, practically not at all. The change is 

 a very decided one as regards color, those flowers with 

 yellow eyes becoming feathered all over with that color on 

 a ground color more or less like that of the flower before 

 the change takes place ; those with white eyes being 

 feathered with white, the former are called Bizarres, the 

 latter Byblcemens. The value of the rectified flower depends 

 upon the clearness of the yellow or white, upon the reg- 

 ularity of the feathering or flaming, the size and form of the 

 petals and shape of the cup being also of importance. 

 Tulip fanciers pride themselves on having the Breeder and 

 rectified flower side by side, and at exhibitions of Tulips 

 they are generally placed together. When once a Tulip has 

 " rectified " it never returns to the Breeder state ; this can 

 only be obtained by means of seeds, and from these may 

 come all sorts excepit the one desired. 



Long cultivation, selection, cross-breeding, etc., may 

 account for this behavior in this species of Tulip. So far as 

 I know it does not occur in any except Gesneriana and its 

 near allies. A few years ago Mr. Baker named at Kew a beau- 

 tiful Tulip with enormous rose-crimson flowers ami a large 

 blue-black eye-like base, calling it T. macrospila. For a 

 time it kept true, and a large stock of it was worked up 

 entirely from offsets. Then it began to break, first produc- 

 ing a paler-colored form, and afterward feathered or " rec- 

 tified " flowers, in which the eye was either like the type or 

 pure white. From this it would appear that no reliance 

 can be placed upon the colors of some of the Gesneriana 

 tulips. Fortunately, "rectification" does not mean dete- 

 rioration, but generally a decided improvement in color 

 attractions. 



