223 
GLADIOLUS INSIGNIS. 
(remarkable corn-flag.) 
class. order. 
TRIANDRIA, MONOGYNIA, 
NATURAL ORDER. 
IRIDACE^, 
Generic Character. — Vide vol. ii. p. 197. 
Specific Character.--A handsome hybrid, with very long narrow leaves, and apparently partially droop- 
ing flower-stalks, on which the blossoms are borne chiefly on the upper side. Flowers of a rich 
reddish crimson hue, having a dash of bluish purple in the centre of the lower segments of the perianth. 
We have to thank Messrs. Lucombe, Pince, and Co., of the Exeter nursery, 
for our figure of this most superb Gladiolus, which was taken from a plant that 
bloomed in their establishment in July 1839. Although we are not favoured with 
any account of its parents, or of the place in which it was raised, we have adopted 
the name under which it was sent, and by which it was purchased, at the sale of 
the late Mr. Colville's plants, Chelsea, among other Gladioli, because it is signifi- 
cantly expressive of its remarkably attractive Sowers, and of their singularly 
brilliant colours. 
If the facilities we possess for ascertaining the degree of admiration in which 
any tribe is held entitle us to express an opinion respecting that bestowed on the 
genus Gladiolus ; we should say that, proportionately with their extremely engaging 
character, and the vivid tints of their blooms, the species are by no means treated 
with sufiicient respect. This disregard of so valuable a group of plants is plainly 
to be accounted for by the fact that Gladioli are usually classed with Cape bulbs, 
and their flowers are consequently deemed too fugitive to render them worthy of 
much regard. A supposition more at variance with the truth cannot well be con- 
ceived. Although their roots are popularly called bulbous, they are what botanists 
term corms ; and instead of the blossoms fading after they have been unfolded for 
one or two days, there is invariably on strong specimens of the best kinds a 
display of them during two or three of the summer months. 
