450 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 187. 



narrowed both ways, evergreen, pinnate, with from twenty to 

 thirty pairs of variable oblique pinna? ; stipites short, blackish 

 brown, naked, or with a few slight scales at base ; pinnas gen- 

 erally subsessile, 2" to 5" long, half as broad, deeply cut into 

 irregular oblique obtuse lobes, unequally wedge-shaped at 

 base, cut away most on the lower side, and sometimes almost 

 if not wholly dimidiate, often truncate at base on the upper 

 side with the superior basal lobe again deeply cleft into in- 

 cised lobes ; lower pinnae gradually reduced, more equal- 

 sided, ovate, slightly stalked, with cuneate or truncate bases, 

 and cleft into three incised lobes ; rachis, blackish brown, like 

 the stipes, channeled, fiexuose, curving from above the middle 

 into semicircles ; sori large, borne on the free veinlets in two 

 to four pairs, each sorus, when mature, filling an entire lobe, 

 and set obliquely to the costa. 



Habitat : Wet cliffs, near Guadalajara, state of Jalisco, De- 

 cember 5th, 1888. This very lovely Fern bears some resem- 

 blance to the incised form of A. Trichomanes, and it is closely 

 allied to that species. It differs from that species, however, 

 conspicuously by the unusual size and position of the promi- 

 nent sori, which are placed within and near the edges of the 

 lobes, so that the fructification appears to be marginal, and 

 by the remarkable curvatures of the exceedingly fiexuose ra- 

 chises. In some specimens there appears to be a slight 

 membraneous edge running along the sides of the rachis and 

 round the margins of the pinnas, having the appearance of a 

 faint bloom when held to the light. 



The excellent portrait of this Fern, on page 449, is from a 

 drawing by Mr. C. E. Faxon. 



Foreign Correspondence. 

 London Letter. 



THE end of the flower-season in the open-air garden is 

 approaching, and the Dahlias almost monopolize the 

 .attention of florists, for the unusually wet and cold August 

 has been disastrous to such flowers of the sun as Gladioli 

 and Lilies, which are the features of English gardens in 

 August. This week I have had a look in at some of the 

 nurseries, and the finest flowers of the season, to my mind, 

 are the hybrid French Cannas at Cannell's, at Swanley. No 

 doubt, the grand productions of Crousse have already 

 crossed the Atlantic, and your lovers of brilliantly colored 

 flowers and noble foliage already have the older kinds 

 under cultivation. These gorgeous plants have come upon 

 us all of a sudden, for I know of no flowers that have been 

 improved in such an extraordinary way in so short a time, 

 and our French neighbors seem to have been at work upon 

 them before we were aware of it. The French florists seem 

 to take the initiative in the production of new races of gar- 

 den-plants, which they do with few exceptions ; Roses, 

 Gladioli, Delphiniums, Ivy Pelargoniums, Montbretias, 

 Chrysanthemums, Caladiums, of all of which we have now 

 such a variety, are mainly due to the enterprise of the French 

 hybridists. These Cannas are well worth a long journey 

 to enjoy, for the brilliancy of their flowers en masse rising 

 from their handsome foliage is different from the ordinary run 

 of greenhouse plants. There are now a good many sorts, 

 mostly all with French names, but those that pleased me 

 most wer.e the following : Paul Bert, a noble, tall-growing 

 variety, with broad leaves stained with plum-purple and 

 large Gladiolus-like flowers of a brilliant orange-red ; 

 Francois Morel, three feet high, flowers an intensely deep 

 crimson ; Keteleeri, dwarf flowers, orange-scarlet; Edouard 

 Andre, brilliant orange-scarlet, rather tall, and certainly one 

 of the finest ; Wilhelm Pfitzer, flowers large and of the rich- 

 est deep crimson, remarkably showy ; Madame de Grillon, 

 flowers yellow, with red centre ; Jules Chretien, flowers 

 large, brilliant scarlet ; Comte de Choiseul, dwarf, only 

 about one and a half feet high, and similar in color to the 

 last ; Admiral Courbet, cherry-crimson ; Professor David, 

 a very distinct sort, with flowers scarlet, blotched and mar- 

 gined on the petals with yellow ; Legionnaire, tall purplish 

 foliage, vivid crimson flowers ; T. S. Ware, orange-scarlet. 

 These comprise a dozen of the very finest kinds, and 

 though from description they may seem to be similar to 

 each other in color, they are really distinct, either in growth 



or shade of color. The best time to obtain a stock of Cannas 

 is when the plants are in a dry state in autumn ; they will then 

 travel as safely as bulbs, and I am taking with me to India a 

 large number of the best kinds. I can foresee what grand 

 plants they will be in masses in the open, as the common 

 Carina, indica is one of the most effective plants there in 

 the garden-landscape. 



At Veitchs', at Chelsea, one may see another new race of 

 hybrids, which is purely of English origin. These are the 

 hybrid Streptocarpuses, which Mr. Watson has already men- 

 tioned. It may be well to add, however, that these new 

 Streptocarpuses are regarded here as one of the most im- 

 portant novelties that have been produced by skillful hy- 

 bridizing. It seems but a few years ago when the species 

 from which these hybrids have been mainly produced were 

 obscure botanic garden-plants, and even up to within a year 

 or so they were not generally known, and Mr. Watson had 

 raised his first crosses at Kew long before even the nur- 

 serymen knew about them. But now that the Messrs. 

 Veitch have taken up the thread of the work where he left 

 off, we shall soon see these beautiful plants common in 

 every greenhouse, for they need only to be seen to be ap- 

 preciated even by those who will only look at showy 

 plants. The species that have been worked upon were 

 generally known in cultivation under the names of 6". Rexii, 

 S. bijforus, S. floribundus, S. polyanthus and 6". Saunderst, 

 but it was not until the extraordinary monophyllus species, 

 S. Dunni, was introduced that any decided break was ob- 

 tained. This species has a huge leaf, and produces an 

 abundance of dull red small flowers, different in tint from 

 any of the rest, so that there was something to work upon. 

 Mr. Watson raised several striking crosses, among them 

 being those named 6". Watsoni and .S". Kewensis, the former 

 especially showing in its flowers the distinct reddish color of 

 6". Dunni. Among the multitude of seedlings he has raised 

 you may single out every shade, ranging from pure white 

 to bright purple, stained with plum-purple and violet, and 

 these are the foundation that the hybridist at Veitchs' had 

 to work upon. Now one ma) r see seedlings at the Chelsea 

 nursery by the thousand, planted out in cold frames, and 

 flowering profusely, and, naturally, some show an advance 

 on the original Kew hybrids both in size of flower and va- 

 riety and brightness of coloring. It may not be rash to 

 predict that eventually we shall have Streptocarpus-flowers 

 as large as those of Gloxinias, the horizontal-flowered type 

 of which they somewhat resemble. As the Streptocarpuses 

 are so easily grown in an ordinary frame during summer, or 

 in a greenhouse, they are destined to become popular, and 

 the fact that they flower so freely and so continuously for 

 several months in the year enhances their value. I 

 counted as many as twenty flowers on a small plant at 

 Veitchs', and being on slender long stalks they are very 

 suitable for cutting. Already the seed of these hybrids is 

 enumerated in the seed catalogue of the firm, so that a 

 pinch of seed may be obtained that would furnish enough 

 plants for a greenhouse. 



As this is the dull season for Orchids they comprise one 

 of the features of the great Chelsea nursery, but I lingered 

 over the other great feature at the present time, which is 

 the Nepenthes, or Pitcher Plant house, which, at this season, 

 after the pitchers have reached full size and color, is 

 at its best. Among the kinds that the grower points out 

 as being of superlative merit is the new N. Northiana, 

 named after Miss North, the traveler and artist who, I be- 

 lieve, discovered it. It has the full-grown pitchers, over 

 a foot long and from three inches to five inches broad, 

 heavily spotted and striped with crimson on a pale green 

 ground. It is extremely handsome in form also, as the 

 broad rim of the pitcher is shaped and reflexed in a beauti- 

 ful way. The other new or notable Pitchers are N. Burkei, 

 N. Curtisii superba and N. cincta, which has the pitchers 

 most beautifully marked with crimson and purple-crimson 

 on pale green. But I consider the finest of all is N. Masiersi- 

 ana, which has a number of red pitchers on every small 

 plant, and has a striking effect among the others. It is 



