GANNAS, CARNATIONS 301 



finest green-leaved sorts, with red flowers, and San Diego is an ex- 

 cellent yellow; but you will have to keep on trying the newcomers 

 in order to keep uptodate and in touch with the best. Good sorts 

 come and go and others take their place. It is only once in awhile 

 that a King Humbert happens. 



I well remember thirty years ago we bought twelve Ganna 

 plants of a recent introduction. It was called Star of '91, a dwarf 

 red, and never was anything more closely watched for the first buds 

 to open. We couldn't imagine anything grander at the time, but 

 its Ught soon grew dim as other brighter stars appeared, and finally 

 went out. So it has been going ever since that time, and thirty 

 years hence others will recall "has-beens" which today seem to us 

 almost perfection itself. 



GANDYTUFT 



See Iberis 



GARNATIONS 



It is just about forty-five years ago that my grandfather at 

 Frankfort-on-the-Main, Germany, showed me for the first time how 

 to prepare a Garnation cutting to be put into cocoanut fiber mixed 

 with washed sand, and impressed on me the fact that Garnations 

 formed one of the florist's main flowers, even if he himself never 

 could actuaUy make any money out of them. 



I have been in touch with Garnations ever since, have watched 

 their development, tried my hand at bringing out new sorts, met 

 with a lot of disappointments, and then forgot all about them when 

 awarded a certificate of merit or able to bring home a few blue rib- 

 bons from the shows. I have spent many happy hours in the pot- 

 ting shed with old-timers, going over some of the sorts we could call 

 to mind, that had made their entry to the accompaniment of a lot 

 of noise from the introducer and all kinds of promises. We would 

 recollect all the many remarkable qualities they were to possess, how 

 the new star would in a short time outshine aU others and bring us 

 wealth, how they occupied the "footlights" for awhile — and then 

 disappeared into everlasting darkness without leaving even a trace. 



Here and there was an exception. It took Enchantress to re- 

 place Daybreak, and Enchantress has outlasted any other sort; 

 and those that are considered best of aU that are with us today are 

 still on trial. To be sure, we are going forward, making headway. 

 Look at a vase of weU grown Laddie, Maine Sunshine, White De- 

 hght. Democracy, Denver, or Eureka, and then recaU to mind 

 Portia, Garfield, Tidal Wave, Hinze's White, or Grace Wilder. 

 But what Wm. Scott predicted to me in Buffalo, twenty years ago, 

 that the day would come when every Garnation grower would raise 

 and grow his own seedlings, has not come true. As with the Rose and 



