PRIMULA CONFERENCE. 



233 



Auricula ; this new colour is a very lovely and decided pink." 

 " There is no doubt, however, that the true pink self is a coming 

 flower, and I name it as one illustration more of the direction 

 in which the Auricula may be improved." The question I should 

 like to ask Mr. Bolton is, whether there is any knowledge of 

 whence that new colour has been derived, and how it has been 

 obtained ? 



Mr. Bolton : In reference to the pink colour, it is something 

 like the pink of the Primula rosea, a very beautiful soft pink. 

 We have been trying for years to see if we could not produce a 

 scarlet, or get a scarlet body ground on the green and the white 

 edges. I think these pink selfs have been the result of a cross 

 between "Duke of Argyll " and a few of Mr. Horner's seedlings. 

 It has given what you may call a weak kind of red, but the 

 pink has not been watery. The "Duke of Argyll" has no 

 paste at all, and we have tried to improve that portion of the 

 flower, and it has caused us to get into some more distinct 

 colours. 



Mr. Horner has contributed the following note on this 

 subject : " The pink selfs originated among seedlings froru a 

 violet self of Mr. Simonite's raising. He and I have seen in this 

 parent, very occasionally, a violet petal with a streak of pink 

 in it. — F. D. Horner."] 



Mr. R. Dean : I will intrude on this meeting only a minute 

 or two to state that in the paper which has been read the 

 author alludes to the green-edged seedling with a red body 

 colour instead of the black. In breeding for green edges, florists 

 hitherto have endeavoured to get the deepest black body colour 

 possible, but in the case of this particular flower you will observe 

 the body colour has become red instead of black, and I think it 

 possible, in course of time, we may have a distinct race of green- 

 edged Auriculas with scarlet body colour. 



Mr. Bolton : We have had it in that form, but it is so very 

 bad and the edge flies so much that we have always discarded it. 



Mr. Baker then made some remarks on the scope and objects 

 of his synopsis, printed below : — 



In my synopsis, said Mr. Baker, I have indicated what I understand to be 

 the European species of the genus Primula, using the term species in the 

 sense in which it is used in Bentham and Hooker's " Genera Plantarum," and in 

 the Kew " Floras" of different parts of the British possessions. I have not 



