iy2 DESCRIPTION OF THE MUSEUM. 



connected with the secret of vegetable life. A fact 

 still more curious is, that many flowers shed 

 their perfume only after sunset, as the geranium 

 tvistCy the gladiolus tristis, the cestrum nocturnum y 

 some species of wall-flower, cheiranthus y etc. ; 

 and that this singular property is almost always 

 announced by their colour, which is a mixture 

 of a brownish red, yellow, and white (i). 



Every year may be seen plants newly arrived, 

 and destined one day to adorn our gardens. 

 Shrubs with brilliant flowers, such as the camelia 

 japonica, and plants used in the decoration of 

 gardens in foreign countries, as the Indian chry- 

 santhemum (2) might reach us by the ordinary 



(1) See a memoir on the cruciform plants, by M. de Candolle, in 

 the Memoirs of the Museum, vol. vn. page 184. 



(2) This species of anthcmis is much cultivated in the gardens of • 

 China, and its different varieties offer every shade of colour except 

 blue. It was not known in Europe till 17S9, when M. Blanchard, 

 a merchant of Marseilles, brought it from China, and presented several 

 stocks to the abbe Ramatuel, who sent them to the King's Garden in 

 1791. It was first placed in the orangery, afterwards in the open air, 

 and as it multiplies rapidly it was soon spread in our gardens. It 

 was introduced into England in 1795. M. Ramatuel published a de- 

 scription of it in 1792, in the Journal of Natural History, vol. 11. in 

 which he proves it to be a distinct species from the chrysanthemum 

 indicum. It is a valuable acquisition, because it blooms in the middle 

 of autumn, when other flowers have disappeared, and resists the 

 first attacks of frost. There is no ornamental plant which accom- 

 modates itself so easily to a variety of climates; it blooms in Belgium 

 and in the Isle of France. 



The abbe Ramatuel is the author of an excellent memoir on buds, 

 of which M. Dcsfontaines has given an extract in the Journal de 

 Physique, vol xlix. page 62. He died in Paris in 1790, 



