124 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 264. 



liouse and fumigating it once a fortnight by smoking his 

 pipe near it, pufling the smoke under a bell-glass placed 

 over the plant. There is a good example of P. tuberculosus 

 in flower at Kevv now, treated after Mr. Spyers' plan. 



G.\L.\NTHUS BvzANTi.vus is a new species of Snowdrop, 

 which Mr. Baker has named from specimens sent to Kevv 

 by Mr. Allen, who makes a specialty of these plants. It is 

 also in the collection of Messrs. T. S. Ware & Co., Totten- 

 ham. It has the look of an ordinary Snowdrop, but when 

 examined with the scrutiny of a fancier of Snowdrops it 

 shows peculiarities of its own. Mr. Baker places it inter- 

 mediate between G. plicatus and G. Elwesii. Its leaves 

 are glaucous, channeled, reflexed along the margins, a foot 

 long, three-quarters of an inch wide. The flower-stalks are 

 six inches long. The flowers have oblong-convex outer 

 segments three-quarters of an inch long, and deeply emar- 

 ginate inner segments, with a green horseshoe mark at the 

 margin and a green blotch at the base. This description 

 would fit fairly well half a dozen species of Snowdrops, so 

 called, still when one sees the flowers together their differ- 

 ences are perceptible. In the " wild garden " at Kew there 

 is now a wide stretch of Snowdrops in full bloom close to 

 the colony of Christmas Roses which I wrote about a few 

 weeks ago. They are common Snowdrops, but what a 

 charm they have here under the tall trees, their white flow- 

 ers, like snowflakes, lying thickly upon the brown leaves 

 and green grass. The Daffodils will soon be open in their 

 thousands close by, and on the other side in this wild gar- 

 den, on the sloping turf, the yellow Crocuses are a cloth of 

 gold. This is one of the easiest forms of gardening, and, 

 at the same time, it is one of the most effective. G. Perryi 

 is another new Snowdrop, described as "differing little 

 from G. Alleni so far as general appearance goes, only the 

 latter has larger flowers and is a purer white." Mr. Baker 

 has also named a form of G. Elwesii, var. robustus, which 

 has a large bulb and a thick glaucous leaf, the flowers 

 scarcely as large as the type. It is said to be very hardy 

 and a late-flowering kind. These three new kinds are cul- 

 tivated by Messrs. VVare & Co., at Tottenham. 



London. 



W. Walson. 



Paris Letter. 



OUT-OF-DOORS horticulture in France has experi- 

 enced in recent years one bad season after another. 

 For the third year m succession we have a winter of 

 American severity. The thermometer in Paris has lately 

 marked thirty degrees of frost, Fahrenheit ; and at Lyons 

 fifty-one degrees, Fahrenheit, an almost unheard of occur- 

 rence, has been registered. 



The supply of fresh flowers in the Central Market of 

 Paris and at the innumerable florists' shops is consequently 

 somewhat reduced by the severe weather, and flowers 

 would be scarce had not the construction of glass-houses 

 for the production of forced flowers been greatly increased 

 in the last half-dozen years. Even on the Riviera, where 

 the mildness of the climate is proverbial, acre upon acre of 

 glass is put up every year, often on very slight and tem- 

 porary structures, in order to aid the action of the sun and 

 to prevent intense radiation during clear cold nights. All 

 the best Roses grown on the Riviera are produced under 

 glass, with the occasional help of hot-water pipes. The 

 protection afforded by glass frames and the solar heat 

 suffices, however, to bring on the buds in a state of im- 

 maculate beauty which no Roses can equal when grown 

 out-of-doors. 



It is owing to the largely increased number of glass- 

 houses on the Riviera that a horticultural exhibition could 

 be held at Cannes at the close of January, a most unusual 

 time for a display of this sort. Highly interesting speci- 

 mens of hybrid Aroids were staged, including several 

 crosses of Anthurium Andreanum and A. Veitchii, all 

 stately plants. Great masses of Chinese Primulas, Cine- 

 rarias, Pinks and Violets formed a striking contrast with 

 the snow-capped hills and mountains in full view from the 

 Exposition building. 



A rare and, in some particulars, an exceedingly puzzling 

 plant is shown every year in great beauty at these exposi- 

 tions at Cannes, namely, Lachenalia pendula, var. Aureli- 

 ana, which was described and figured on page 396 of the 

 Revue Horticole for 1890. Accordmg to a tradition held 

 sacred on the spot, this plant was found wild not many 

 years ago on the Esterel, some miles west of Cannes, near 

 the line of the Via Aurelia, a great Roman highway into 

 Provence. 



At first sight it seemed preposterous that a plant belong- 

 ing to a genus whose representatives are all natives of 

 South Africa should be discovered growing wild in Europe 

 at the end of the nineteenth century, after escaping 

 the notice of botanists and country people for hundreds 

 of years. This is made all the more incredible by the fact 

 that the plant produces bright and showy flowers not at all 

 likely to be passed by unnoticed On the other hand, it 

 cannot be denied that it is a very distinct form of Lache- 

 nalia, and if it must be referred to L. pendula, as the best 

 botanists believe, it is at least a strongly marked variety. 

 It differs from L. pendula in its stronger and more compact 

 habit, in the broad green leaves and in the greater number 

 of flowers, often amounting to forty or fifty on a spike, and 

 in the fact that it blooms earlier. At Cannes, L. pen- 

 dula flowers about the middle of January, while this 

 variety is commonly in flower on or before Christmas, that 

 is, a fortnight or three weeks earlier. 



At this season the greatest quantity of flowers are sent 

 from the Riviera to Paris. Roses, Pinks, Sweet Violets, 

 the feathery Acacia dealbata, etc., and the flowers of many 

 bulbous plants. The snow-white Roman Hyacinths are 

 shipped by tons to northern cities, and the Paris florists 

 have devised anew trick by which to tempt their customers. 

 They color the spikes of flowers by immersing the stems 

 in chemicals dissolved in water ; in this way, at the end of 

 a few hours, the whole inflorescence becomes evenly dyed 

 from within. The favorite shades of color are a rosy lilac, 

 salmon pink, and glaucous green, suggesting the color of 

 the flowers of Ixia viridiflora. Bright crimson and golden 

 yellow trusses of Lilac have been produced, and are the nov- 

 elty of the week. It is claimed that the process makes the 

 flowers last longer instead of shortening their power of du- 

 ration. The coloring substances, extracted from coals, 

 bear terribly long compound names. The same process 

 was applied to Pinks last year with only indifferent effect, 

 the petals being dyed unequally and showing patches of 

 color on a white ground. With White Hyacinths and forced 

 Lilacs the deception is quite complete. 



At the Concours General Agricole, which is the great agri- 

 cultural fair held in Paris at the Palais de I'lndustrie every 

 winter, some space is usually devoted to ornamental and 

 forced flowers. Although no heating department was pro- 

 vided last year, some of the leading houses volunteered to 

 exhibit floral novelties. Vilmorin-Andrieux et Cie. showed 

 improved forms of Cyclamen Persicum of immense size 

 and great beauty, also very large seedlings of Primula ob- 

 conica, and in large numbers the no less perpetual-flower- 

 ing Primula Forbesii, a native of the Chinese province of 

 Yun-nan. This plant is very pretty and extremely grace- 

 ful, with slender airy floral stems which require support ; 

 they are a foot or a foot and a half tall, and bear on thread- 

 like stalks four or five whorls of pretty flowers not unlike 

 those of Primula farinosa in shape and color. The first 

 plant originally raised from seed in 1890 bloomed in Sep- 

 tember of the same year, and has never been out of bloom 

 since that time, ten to fifteen spikes being always in bloom 

 together. 



Chrysanthemums in flower are not a common sight in 

 February, yet a good group of them were shown on the 

 same occasion by Monsieur Boutreux, of Montreuil. The 

 plants, of course, were not forced, but rather kept back. 

 The best kinds among fifty or sixty varieties staged were : 

 Fair Maid of Guernsey, Mademoiselle Marie Hoste, Peli- 

 can, Monsieur Parent, Louis Varay, Etoile de Lyon, Grandi- 

 florum Alcazar, Yellow Dragon, Monsieur Boutreux, Dr. 



