PiEO'NIA MOUTA'N. 
Papaveracea. 
POPPY-FLOWERED MOUTAN P.EONY. 
Class. Order. 
POLYANDRIA. DIGYNIA. 
Natural Order. 
ranunculacea:. 
Native of 
Height. 
Flowers in 
Habit. 
Introduced 
China. 
3 feet. 
April, June. 
Shrub. 
in 1806. 
No. 1097. 
The ancient poets make Paeon a physician of 
merit, and of value — 
“A wise physician, skilled our wounds to heal. 
Is more than armies to the public weal.” Iliad 11, 637. 
Thus says Homer, and he makes Paeon, to cure 
Pluto of a wound, inflicted by Hercules, by using 
the plant that afterwards was called Paeonia. 
At No. 241 will be found a semi-double variety 
of this plant, in which the central colouring is 
softened and diffused over two thirds of each petal, 
instead of being concentrated into a strongly col- 
oured rayed blotch, at the base of each, as in the 
present flower. Historical notice there gave place 
to the description of an important mode of propa- 
gating these plants, and to which we would again 
call attention. 
Of the Moutan or Tree Paeony, there are several 
varieties in cultivation, their flowers varying in 
colour from a deep rose to white ; some being single, 
others double in different degrees ; part of them 
having been brought from China, and others hav- 
ing since been raised from seeds in this country. For 
the first Moutan Paeony, England is indebted to the 
275 . 
