SINGLE AND DECORATIVE DAHLIAS. 



19 



(small, but always amass of bloom), Empress of India, Constance 

 (hardly so pure a white as Henry Patrick, but making a hand- 

 somer plant in the garden), Charming Bride, Cochineal, William 

 Raynor, Mrs. J. Douglas, Lady Marsham, William Pearce, 

 Henry Patrick, Mrs. E. Hunt (small, good for cutting), Mrs. 

 L. Shuter. 



These so-called " Decorative " Dahlias form a sort of transition 

 group, which will probably be allowed to disappear when 

 varieties of the true Cactus form are obtained with all the good 

 points of colour and habit which now characterise some of the 

 Decorative Dahlias. For instance, Empress of India, in spite of 

 its half-quilled petal and of its often having too much green 

 visible in the flower, is wanted until there is raised a true Cactus 

 variety of similar colour which shall be equally effective both in 

 the garden and in the cut state ; Constance and Henry Patrick 

 cannot be discarded until the arrival of a pure white Cactus ; and 

 William Raynor, although its brilliant salmon and orange flowers 

 are of the wrong type and are nearly always cross-eyed, never- 

 theless in the garden produces the most telling effect, which is 

 only surpassed by Glare of the Garden. 



Of Dahlias of the Show type, the flowers are generally too 

 ponderous to be very valuable in the ordinary way as cut flowers, 

 but a good many varieties, of bushy habit that have stiff, sturdy 

 flower- stems are decorative enough in the garden ; such, namely, 

 as John Bennett, Cardinal, Mrs. Langtry, Lustrous, Gaiety, 

 Rifleman, H. Glasscock, Willie Garratt, and others. 



It will thus be seen that the term " Decorative Dahlias " 

 includes in reality a considerable number of each and every 

 section ; and while the attention of raisers may well be specially 

 directed to the extension of that very beautiful section, the true 

 Cactus Dahlias, it is to be hoped that the general culture of the 

 Dahlia — perhaps the most useful of all autumn-flowering plants 

 — will continue greatly to extend throughout the country. 



Discussion. 



Mr. Shirley Hibbeed, in reference to the height to which 

 Dahlias grow, said that the dwarf forms were praised, and 

 rightly so. The Dahlia had been dwarfed and improved, not 

 as the result of breeding, but as the result of cultivation. In 



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