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GLADIOLUS FLORIBUNDUS — FLOWERS AND FRUITS OF SCRIPTURE. 
The Amherstia has been cultivated in 
England for the last ten years ; hut Mrs. 
Lawrence, F.II.S. of Ealing Park, Middlesex, 
who obtained an imported plant not more 
than two years since, has had the honour of 
first blooming it in England. Under a special 
course of management, her plant produced 
blossoms in the spring of the present year. 
The first raceme produced was sent as a fit- 
ting present to Her Most Gracious Majesty 
the Queen ; this was borne by a plant not 
more than eleven feet high. A beautiful 
figure, prepared from Mrs. Lawrence's speci- 
men, has been published in the Botanical 
Magazine. 
GLADIOLUS FLORIBUNDUS. 
Florists have within the last few years 
produced some very splendid hybrids and 
garden varieties in the family of Gladiolus ; 
and this has not been confined to England, 
but lias been more or less the case in all the 
European countries where Horticulture is in 
the ascendant. We have now before us the 
portraits of some very fine Belgian varieties, 
which have been figured in the Ghent Annates, 
from whence we shall quote the description of 
their origin and characteristics. 
" Dr. D'Avoine, of Malines, has been suc- 
cessful in raising a great number of interesting 
varieties of Gladiolus. We saw a charming 
bouquet of them in the month of August, 
1848. The Committee of the Royal Society 
of Agriculture and Botany of Ghent, who 
are appointed to superintend the plates given 
in their Annales, selected four of these 
varieties, to which M. D'Avoine, in his love 
and respect for the honour of science in 
Belgium, named after men celebrated for their 
learning. This example deserves to be cited, 
and we highly approve of it. To have the 
names of our national Pantheon figured in 
horticulture is certainly as good as the singu- 
lar and unhappy mania of giving to varieties 
of flowers names which are often far from 
awakening any honourable remembrance. 
When history, with its respectable and vene- 
rated names, shall serve to regulate the 
nomenclature of flowers, a double object shall 
have been attained, — these names shall be 
associated with worthy objects, and our illus- 
trious predecessors will be honoured by their 
example being imitated." 
The description of these four varieties of 
the Gladiolus floribundus runs thus :— 
" Itembertus Dodona-us. — The perianth is 
regularly formed with six divisions, of which 
three are yellow and three red ; but most fre- 
quently the two first red divisions have their 
margins yellow, or a portion of that colour on 
the purple base. The inferior divisions are 
striated with purple, their point being entirely 
of that tint. This variety has a severe as- 
pect, like the traits of the illustrious professor 
of Leyden ; and it will be perceived how 
much M. D'Avoine must have thought of the 
celebrated botanist of Malines, in surveying 
the grave corolla of this gladiolus. 
" Christophe Longueil. — This variety is 
much more lively. The perianth has eight 
divisions : four are red, tinted with white, 
with the nerves also white ; two are uniform 
purple, and two golden yellow, with the points 
purple. Longueil was a savant of Malines, 
who wrote commentai'ies on Pliny, a history 
of plants, &c. and was a great lover of gar- 
dening. He died in 1 522, at Padua. 
" Regnerus Bruitsma. — Flowers delicate 
and graceful. The perianth is almost regular, 
with six rosy divisions, ornamented with a 
white line or stripe in the middle ; the under 
division smaller, with only a single tint of dull 
yellow. Regnier Bruitsma was a learned phy- 
sician in the town of Malines ; he published a new 
edition ofl/JEcole de Salerne, and died in 1617. 
" Georges Van Bye. — In this variety the 
perianth has six unequal divisions : the three 
upper broad, rose and purple, these tints 
merging into a brick red ; the three inferior 
divisions smaller and straighter, the two 
lateral ones yellow dotted with red, that of 
the middle red. M. D'Avoine published an 
elegant necrology of Thomas Van Rye, a 
famous physician of Malines. Clusis, by the 
by, in treating of the Phillyrea and tulips, 
speaks of Georges Van Rye, one of the 
greatest horticulturists of his time in respect 
to importations. We have already observed 
that the ancients honoured the gladiolus, and 
beheld in its beautiful forms the gods meta- 
morphosed. The poetic eye of M. D'Avoine 
has seen in them, in our day, a token of re- 
membrance of humanity's benefactors — more 
majorum." 
THE FLOWERS AND FRUITS OF SCRIPTURE. 
In the authorized version of the Holy 
Bible the "paper reed" is mentioned but 
once (Isa. xix. 7). In that passage, how- 
ever, it is by no means clear that this is the 
THE PAPYRUS, OR PAPER REED. 
plant intended, for the Hebrew term aroth 
there employed is explained by the learned 
in these matters to mean " any grassy reed," 
and the true paper reed has another and 
