364: 



FLOWERS. 



Chap. x. 



CfiP- 



with woolly berries, and others with recurved thorns. Loudon truly 

 remarks that the chief reason why the hawthorn has yielded more varieties 

 than most other trees, is that curious nurserymen select any remarkable 

 variety out of the immense beds of seedlings which are annually raised for 

 making hedges. The flowers of the hawthorn usually include from one to 

 three pistils ; but in two varieties, named Monogyna and Sibirica, there is 

 only a single pistil ; and d'Asso states that the common thorn in Spain is 

 constantly in this state. 166 There is also a variety which is apetalous, 

 or has its petals reduced to mere rudiments. The famous Glastonbury 

 thorn flowers and leafs towards the end of December, at which time it 

 bears berries produced from an earlier crop of flowers. 167 It is worth 

 notice that several varieties of the hawthorn, as well as of the lime and 

 juniper, are very distinct in their foliage and habit whilst young, but in the 

 course of thirty or forty years become extremely like each other ; 168 thus 

 reminding us of the well-known fact that the deodar, the cedar of Lebanon, 

 and that of the Atlas, are distinguished with the greatest ease whilst young, 

 but with difficulty when old. 



$t 



Flowees. 



I shall not for several reasons treat the variability of plants which are 

 cultivated for their flowers alone at any great length. Many of our favourite 

 kinds in their present state are the descendants of two or more species 

 crossed and commingled together, and this circumstance alone would render 

 it difficult to detect the differences due to variation. For instance, our 

 Boses, Petunias, Calceolarias, Fuchsias, Verbenas, Gladioli, Pelargoniums, 

 &c, certainly have had a multiple origin. A botanist well acquainted with 

 the parent-forms would probably detect some curious structural differences 

 in their crossed and cultivated descendant ; and he would certainly observe 

 many new and remarkable constitutional peculiarities. I will give a few 

 instances, all relating to the Pelargonium, and taken chiefly from Mr. 

 Beck, 169 a famous cultivator of this plant : some varieties require more 

 water than others; some are " very impatient of the knife if too greedily 

 used in making cuttings ; " some, when potted, scarcely " show a root at 

 the outside of the ball of the earth ; " one variety requires a certain amount 

 of confinement in the pot to make it throw up a flower-stem; some 

 varieties bloom well at the commencement of the season, others at the close; 

 one variety is known, 17 " which will stand " even pine-apple top and bottom 

 heat, without looking any more drawn than if it had stood in a common 

 greenhouse ; and Blanche Fleur seems as if made on purpose for growing 

 in winter, like many bulbs, and to rest all summer." These odd constitu- 

 tional peculiarities would fit a plant when growing in a state of nature for 

 widely different circumstances and climates. 



166 Loudon's 'Arboretum et Frutice- 

 tum,' vol. ii. p. 834. 



167 Loudon's ' Gardener's Mag.,' vol 

 ix. 1833, p. 123. 



168 Ibid., vol. xi. 1835, p. 503. 



169 « Gardener's Chron.,' 1845, p. 623. 



170 D. Beaton, in ' Cottage Gardener/ 

 1860, p. 377. See also Mr. Beck, on 

 the habits of Queen Mab, in ' Gardener's 

 Chronicle,' 1845, p. 226. 



