A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE CHRYSANTHEMUM. 117 



variety was growing in the garden of the Apothecaries' Com- 

 pany at Chelsea, under the name of Matricaria indica. It is 

 extremely doubtful whether this was really a Chrysanthemum, 

 for the description in Mr. Philip Miller's dictionary, and the 

 dried specimen preserved, do not tally. Whatever it was, it 

 soon perished, and the fact remains indisputable that, until 

 the year 1789, nothing like a large-flowering Chrysanthe- 

 mum is known to have been cultivated in Europe without inter- 

 mission. 



In that year, notorious for many events in the history of 

 France, a M. Blancard (usually called Blanchard, an error for 

 which French ^writers are mainly responsible) introduced from 

 the Far East into Marseilles, his native town, three plants of a 

 flower that was destined to play an important part in the annals 

 of horticulture. They were not at that time recognised as 

 Chrysanthemums, but regarded as large-flowering Camomiles. 

 Only one, however, survived, and this became subsequently 

 known as the old purple Chrysanthemum. M. Eamatuelle 

 in the Journal d'Histoire Naturelle, wrote a very exhaustive 

 account of the new-comer, and contributed to spread it abroad 

 to a great extent, as he had formed a high opinion of its value 

 as a late autumn-blooming flower. 



The following year M. Cels, a celebrated Parisian nursery- 

 man, and afterwards a foreign corresponding member of this 

 Society, sent plants to the Gardens at Kew. We hear but little 

 of it until Curtis, in the Botanical Magazine for 1796, figured and 

 described it as having flowered the previous November at Col- 

 vill's nursery at Chelsea. He, like some of the French botan- 

 ists, called it G. indicum, and by this name it was botanically 

 known for many years. 



English horticulturists were not slow to appreciate its value. 

 Within a few years of its introduction here further importations 

 were made, and Mr. John Reeves, the Society's agent at Canton, 

 sent over some new kinds. Mr. John Damper Parks, a traveller 

 employed on their behalf, also augmented the list to a considerable 

 extent. At Chiswick, in the Horticultural Gardens, there were 

 twenty- seven varieties cultivated in 1824, and two years later the 

 number appears to have grown to forty-eight. 



The style of nomenclature in vogue at this period bore little 

 resemblance to that of the present. The flowers were distin- 



