78 



BULBS AND TUBEROUS-ROOTED PLANTS. 



created a most wonderful sensation. The fact of the 

 Marchioness of Bute, one of the most enthusiastic 

 patrons of botany, having introduced it into England 

 from Madrid in 1789, was a sufficient indorsement of its 

 beauty and usefulness, to make it at once one of the 

 most popular flowering plants. When the Dahlia was 

 first introduced into Spain, it was named by Abbe 

 Cavanilles, director of the Eoyal Gardens, in honor of 

 Dr. Andrew Dahl, a Swedish botanist. After that, Prof. 

 Wildenow, of Berlin, laboring under the impression that 

 the name adopted by Cavanilles had been previously 

 applied to another plant, discontinued the name Dahlia, 

 and substituted that of Georgina, in honor of Prof. 

 George, of St. Petersburgh. For a number of years it 

 was known under the latter name, and is so termed in 

 some of Loudon's writings. 



Its cultivation, however, did not become very gen- 

 eral until the illustrious naturalists, Humboldt and 

 Bonpland, in descending from the tableland in Mexico 

 towards the coast of the Pacific ocean, rediscovered it 

 growing on the prairies, at a height of nearly five thou- 

 sand feet above the level of the sea. The plants then 

 discovered were transmitted to the botanical garden at 

 Mexico, and in 1804 transferred to the various public 

 gardens throughout Europe. But little progress was 

 made in their cultivation, or in the development of the 

 species, for several years thereafter. The following 

 account of the origin of the double forms we take from 

 the "History of the Dahlia," by Eobert Hogg, Esq., of 

 London, published in 1853. 



"Several cultivators on the continent, observing the 

 natural disposition of the Dahlia to sport from its orig- 

 inal form, began now to direct their attention to raising 

 new varieties, and treating it as a florists' flower. Many 

 attempts were made to procure double flowers, but with- 

 out success. In 1806, the gardener at Malmaison for- 



