SWEET-SMELLING PLANTS 



lOI 



Pyrus. — An extensive genus of fruiting shrubs and trees, natives of 

 the northern hemisphere of Europe, America, and the mountainous 

 regions of Central Asia. They inchide the apple and pear of com- 

 merce. The family, although exceedingly beautiful and valuable, 

 need but little comment from our pomt of view. One or two of 

 the ornamental flowering kinds, however, deserve passing notice. 

 P. coronaria, the Xorth American sweet-scented Crab, is a lovely 

 little tree, with large pale pink deliciously-scented flowers. P. 

 aiKjustifolia, in both its single and double form, bears delicate pink 

 fragrant flowers. The single-flowered species extends over large 

 areas in the Atlantic States of Xorth America. When in flower, 

 says Sargent, it is not surpassed in beauty by any of the small 

 trees of North America ; and the traveller in the gloomy and 

 monotonous pine-forests of the Southern States experiences no 

 more delightful sensation than when he comes unexpectedly into 

 some retired glade and finds it filled with these trees, covered by 

 their delicious and fragrant flxowers. 



Pyrethrum. — See Anthemis. A common order of composite plants 

 with aromatic foliage. 



Randia. — A genus of evergreeii shrubs, natives of the East, and closely 

 allied to the Gardenia ; there are several species, many of them 

 very fragrant. Of these we notice the following : — B. dumetorum, 

 R. longispina, P. longifiora. P. capitata, and P. Humholdti. 



Ranunculus Buchanani. — A rare Xew Zealand species of this extensive 

 family, with delicately-scented cream-coloured flowers. 



Raphiolepis ovata [Jaimnese Hairthorn). — A Japanese evergreen 

 shrub, bearing clusters of sweet-scented white flowers. 



Reseda odorata. — Who does not know the fragrant Mignonette or 

 Little Darling, one of our most cherished and deservedly favourite 

 floral treasures, the simplest and sweetest -scented of our garden 

 flowers, and a welcome plant with all? One cannot imagine a 

 garden being complete without this grateful plant, whose sweetness 

 wins all hearts. It is now many years since this odorous weed of 

 Egypt first perfumed European gardens. It would appear that it 

 first found its way from its Egyptian home to the South of France, 

 where it was welcomed by the name of Mignonette, signifying m 

 French 'little darlmg,' and this happy designation has been found 

 too appropriate for the dainty little flower to be ever afterwards 

 exchanged for any other. It is certain that it soon got into the 

 gardens of the London florists, so as to enable them to supply the 

 metropolis with plants to furnish out the balconies — a fact noticed 

 by the poet Cowper, who attained the age of twenty-one in the 



