502 DOUBLE FLOWERS ACCIDENTAL, 



in keeping a seed for several years, we fatigue it and weaken it. Then, 

 when we place it in a suitable boU, we change its natural state, and 

 from a wild plant make it a cultivated one. What proves our position 

 is, that plants, in their wild state, shedding their seeds naturally, and 

 Bowing them as soon as they faU to the ground, yet in a long succession 

 of time scarcely ever produce plants with double flowers. We think, 

 then, after what we have said, that whenever a gardener wishes to 

 obtain, double flowers, he ought not to sow the seeds till after having 

 kept them for as long a time as possible. — This practice ought to be 

 observed with all plants that we wish should produce double flowers, 

 for all varieties of the Brompton Stocks, Pinks, &c. 



When plants are excessively stimulated by ruausually warm 

 damp weather at the period of flowering, their flowers in such 

 cases sometimes become monstrous : but the effect of this is to 

 lengthen their axis of growth, and to form true leaves instead 

 of floral organs, just the reverse of what occurs in a truly 

 double flower ; the varieties of Eosa gaUica often exhibit this 

 kind of change. In damp cloudy summers, some flowers 

 assume the appearance of being double, by the change of then- 

 sexual organs into small green leaves, as occurred very 

 generally to Potentilla nepalensis in the summer of 1839, a 

 representation of which is given at page 90 ; but there was, at 

 the same time, scarcely a trace of any tendency, on the part of 

 those leaves, to assume the colour or texture of petals. 



There is, evidently, a greater tendency in some flowers to 

 become double than in others, and especially in those having 

 great numbers of stamens or pistils. All our favourite double 

 flowers, Hepaticas, Pseonies, Camellias, Anemones, Eoses, 

 Cherries, Plums, Eanunculuses, belong to this class ; and, in 

 proportion as the natural number of stamens diminishes, so do 

 both the disposition to become double, and the beauty of the 

 flowers when altered. The Pink and Carnation with ten 

 stamens are the handsomest race next to those just mentioned ; 

 while the Hyacinth, the Tulip, the Stock, and the Wallflower 

 with six stamens, and the Auricula and Polyanthus with five, 

 form altogether an inferior race, if symmetry of form, and 

 regularity of arrangement in the parts of the flower, are 

 regarded as beauties of the highest order. If the mere circum- 

 stance of a plant having but a small number of stamens be a 



