November 26, 1890.] 



Garden and Forest. 



569 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office : Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted bv Professor C. S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND CLASS MATTER AT THE POST OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 1890. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



Editorial Articles:— Form in Flowers 569 



Thejesup Collection of the Woods of the United States 57° 



A Slaughtered Giant. (With illustration.) 57° 



The Sequoia Forests of the Sierra Nevada. (With map.) 



n Frank J. Walker. 570 



Plant Notes :— Some Recent Portraits S7 2 



Foreign Correspondence:— London Letter W. Watson. 574 



Cultural Department :— ' ' Very Good " and "Best " Apples, 



T. N. Hoskins, M.D. 574 



The Root Rot of Salsify Professor Byron D. Halsted. 576 



Carludovicas • >v - H- Taplin. 576 



Variation in Color of Chrysanthemums J. N. Gerard. 577 



Notes from a Wild Garden Rev. W. E. Hill. 577 



Notes on Shrubs J- G.J. 577 



Potentillas C.N. Rea. 578 



Correspondence : — The Lake Scenery of Central New York. .Dorcas E. Collins. 578 



The Trees of the City of Washington A. A. Crozier. 578 



Periodical Literature 579 



Notes 579 



Illustrations .—The Big Tree Forests (Sequoia gigantea) 573 



Felling One of the Big Trees (Sequoia gigantea) 575 



Form in Flowers. 



COLOR, form, size, habit and fragrance — these are the 

 characteristics which, varying from flower to flower, 

 produce in their different combinations the myriad types 

 that delight us. Fragrance, however, may be set aside 

 just now as not appealing to the sense of sight; for it is 

 this sense which judges of beauty, and it is of the beauty 

 of flowers that we intend to speak. And especially of 

 beauty as shown in cultivated plants and modified by the 

 hand of man. 



The fact has been noted in these pages that the average 

 eye is more impressed and attracted by beauty of color 

 than by beauty of form. To combine colors well needs, 

 it is true, the most highly cultivated taste ; but the appre- 

 ciation of single tints or of gradations of one -or two 

 plainly harmonious tones is a not unusual gift. Form, 

 on the other hand, is seldom thoroughly appreciated ex- 

 cept by trained eyes. In consequence, although the judg- 

 ment of florists and their patrons is sometimes at fault in 

 matters of color, it is in matters of form that it oftenest 

 goes astray. 



One of the facts which prove this statement is the con- 

 stant confounding of mere size with beauty. In every- 

 thing which appeals to the eye — from trees to churches, 

 from jewels to mountains, from pictures to rosebuds — size 

 is a potent element in arousing interest and admiration, its 

 appeal to the sense of wonder being constantly confounded 

 with an appeal to the sense of beauty. There are many 

 cases, of course, when it is a true aesthetic factor, rightly 

 augmenting delight. Other things being equal, an immense 

 church interior or a huge diamond is more beautiful than 

 a small one. All occidental men would doubtless give a 

 similar verdict with regard to trees. Yet are not the Japan- 

 ese now acknowledged to be a people of finer artistic sense 

 than our own ? And a Japanese art-critic in America has 

 replied, when the small size of certain New England trees 

 was excused, that to care for the bigness of trees was 

 "barbaric" — their form was the primary, their size but a 

 secondary consideration. But, however it may be with 

 trees, it is certainly barbaric to lay too much stress on size 



in flowers. When Nature herself makes them large she 

 adapts shape and details to size. She draws their outlines 

 with a bold hand, usually builds them of solid substance, 

 gives them a massive array of pistils and stamens, and sels 

 them on plants with sturdy stems and broad, firm leaves. 

 Look at the Magnolia, the Night Blooming Ccreus and the 

 Artichoke if you would see big flowers as Nature loves to 

 design them. There are exceptions to the rule, and Nature 

 occasionally sets a big blossom on a small plant, but we 

 instantly recognize the fact, and are more impressed by the 

 oddity of such plants than by anything else about them. 

 The best guide for man's efforts at improvement is always 

 to follow the rule of Nature, not to imitate her exceptions. 

 She can be graceful even when working with emphatic 

 contrasts; but it is easier for him to succeed when he keeps 

 to obvious harmonies. 



There is a class of plants, just now very popular, which 

 illustrates how gardeners may go astray in their improve- 

 ments. These are the Tuberous Begonias. Differing much 

 in the size of their leaves, these plants are naturally of low 

 habit, with such weak flower-stalks that the blossoms 

 droop, and with small flowers of somewhat irregular out- 

 line — that is, the type, as Nature designed it, was a small, 

 drooping, irregular flower. The aim of the gardener, how- 

 ever, is to make it large, regular and erect. There are 

 countless splendid "improved" Begonias in cultivation 

 now, but the more one looks at them the more one feels 

 that — apart from the variety of beautiful colors they show, 

 to which all admiration is due — their cultivators have 

 wasted their time. The increased size of the blossoms 

 makes them look too large for the plants; their irregularity 

 of outline and want of symmetry, so charming in smaller 

 flowers, are displeasing on a larger scale, giving almost 

 the effect of malformed flowers rather than of such as 

 Nature had intended to be unsymmetrical ; while the 

 greater erectness of the blossom had destroyed its grace 

 without giving it real dignity. But we are told the ulti- 

 mate aim of the cultivator — true erectness and perfect sym- 

 metry — will soon be achieved. And if so, what will be 

 gained ? A commonplace-looking flower, with character- 

 istics similar to those of a dozen others, in place of an indi- 

 vidual, peculiar type that will have been "improved" out 

 of existence. Big regular blossoms, holding their faces 

 "well up," will undoubtedly be more "striking," but they 

 will no longer be Begonias for any one who, beneath a 

 name, cares to find a distinct floral type. 



Of course, too, these Begonias are being doubled, and 

 with their doubling the last traces of their identity will dis- 

 appear. But it is almost hopeless to protest against this, 

 the most common sin of cultivators. Who, that cares for 

 types as expressions of Nature's creative power, and who 

 that has any eye for beauty of form, can look with patience 

 on the fashion which converts the exquisite cup of the 

 Daffodil into a ragged lump of yellow, which mars the 

 curve and fills the hollow of the Tulip's bowl with crowded 

 petals, which "improves" the bell of the Hyacinth until it 

 is no longer a bell, and the four-pointed star of the Bou- 

 vardia till it is no star ? How, one wonders, has the Lily- 

 of-the-Valley so long escaped, and when will Nature's 

 beautiful half doubling of the Water Lily be carried further, 

 until the last of the golden stamens disappears ? And may 

 not a "full double" Iris be the next high priced novelty ? 

 Nothing, indeed, seems too dreadful to anticipate, now that 

 Narcissi are advertised for their close resemblance to double 

 Camellias, and the ruined form of a Tiger Lily, dubbed 

 flore pleno, decorates the pages of the latest plant-cata- 

 logues. Double Azaleas we have long had with us, and 

 double Snowdrops. And if the shape and habit of the 

 Begonia are to be utterly changed, will not some one make 

 the Cyclamen hold up its head and spread out its petals in 

 an orthodox way ? 



We do not wish to imply that there are no flowers 

 which may well be doubled, that increase of size should 

 never be aimed at, or that habit of growth can never be im- 

 proved. It is only to protest against excess and misdirection 



