ANNUAL FLOWERS. 



185 



go on with the next year instead of picking out several : one may see 

 many nearly as good, or perhaps quite, in a batch of seedlings, but I 

 found that when I kept to one only, I started then at any rate with less 

 mixture of blood. It takes, however, a longer time to secure a large stock 

 of a strain by this selection of one, but it entails less labour in selection 

 for the next three or four years, and the final result is more satisfactory 

 and lasting ; the improvements or novelties which I have introduced from 

 time to time have been, I flatter myself, far more fixed in character in 

 consequence, than the generality of new selections. 



There are many more kinds of annuals which have been improved 

 either in habit or colour or both, or in which new colours have appeared, 

 or sometimes a variegation of leaf has shown itself, as in the Nasturtiums. 



Fig. 29. — Nemesia strumosa suttoni and var. compacta. 



Some few years ago I introduced the Nasturtium 'Queen of the Tom 

 Thumbs,' a variety with very variegated white and green leaves. This 

 took me six years to fix in character, starting with one plant only, which 

 appeared in some thousands of plants of ' Lilliput,' and at the end of that 

 time I had only four pounds of seed to put into commerce ; it is a very 

 shy seeder. The first year half the plants came green leaved, half varie- 

 gated ; the next year about 30 per cent, were green leaved, the next 

 year about 20 per cent., the next about 10 per cent. only. To-day it 

 keeps true to the variegated type, with the exception of perhaps 5 per 

 cent, green. It had dark maroon-crimson flowers, and was a most 

 striking variation in the Nasturtium ; no variegated-leaved form had 

 before been seen. Now to-day we are getting many more colours of the 

 same variegated-leaved or ' Queen of Tom Thumb ' Nasturtium, and also 



