12 
THE DAHLIA, AND ITS PROGRESS. 
■whole approachable by good roads, to save 
labour in carrying on the proper dressings 
and bringing off the matured crops; and the 
whole watched, kept in order, supplied, and 
the rents collected, by a man always on the 
spot. This is the way to make allotments 
useful to the holders, beneficial to the neigh- 
bourhood, and, above all, important to all 
interested in the moral and religious improve- 
ment of the working classes. 
THE DAHLIA, AND ITS PROGRESS. 
Among all the flowers that have been 
noticed by florists as show subjects, none have 
attracted more attention than the dahlia ; yet 
the really improved varieties do not amount 
to one-tenth of the number sent out under 
warranty as show flowers. The present year 
actually affords little or nothing in the way of 
advance, and yet we have several praised by 
the newspapers as grand acquisitions. Any- 
body who reads Mr. Glenny's description this 
year, in the Almanack for 1848, will scarcely 
fail to observe that he has confined himself to 
descriptive particulars, and has altogether ab- 
stained from recommendation. Let any one 
who grows the dahlia for exhibition read 
these descriptions quietly, and judge calmly, 
and see whether there is anything to tempt 
him to buy. We have a flower of Mr. 
Whale's, held up certainly as the crack flower 
of the season, and it is just possible to be so. 
The only time it was shown, to our know- 
ledge, it was falling to pieces, but there was 
the remains of a noble and beautiful flower. 
It was a pure white, a beautiful outline, hand- 
some rounding face, compact well-formed 
petals, laid as symmetrically as possible ; but 
the inference drawn by growers when a thing 
is seen but once, and then seen badly, is that 
it is uncertain. This may or may not be, for 
some men care little about prizes at country 
shows, and will not take the trouble to show 
at them. Mr. Whale generally confines his 
exhibitions to the metropolitan and the Salis- 
bury shows ; so that his Delight, though only 
seen once, and in bad condition, may never- 
theless be as certain as most flowers ; and if 
so, it is a splendid variety, an improvement 
on all the edged flowers. However, going to 
the merits of the present year's dahlias, we 
are directed to Gem and Shylock, as two 
grand acquisitions, whereas we maintain that 
(even allowing all Mr. Glenny says of them 
to be true) neither of them beat flowers in 
the same way already in our collections. Mr. 
Glenny says of Shylock, that it is " rather 
coarse," that the petals are "large," and that the 
" outline is not perfect ;" all of which is per- 
fectly true. The outline is a sort of rosette, 
instead of a circle ; and we aver that Scarlet 
Gem is worth a thousand of it. Shylock is a 
good flower of the old school, and it is, more- 
over, a certain flower ; it is in scarlets (sup- 
posing it were a good scarlet) what Essex 
Triumph is in darks; Berryer beats the one, 
and Gem the other, as completely as Spring- 
field Rival beat all its predecessors. But a 
certain flower is sure to be in more stands 
than an ordinary one, though it were twenty 
degrees worse. Though we insist upon it 
that Gem and Berryer beat completely in 
these two classes, let us be understood not to 
object to Shylock as a new flower; but the 
extravagant praises bestowed on it proceed 
either from interested, or from ignorant, or 
from inconsiderate people. Gem is a style of 
flower that we have had various grades of ; 
the Maid of Bath was the coarsest, the 
Bridesmaid was better, and the Marchioness 
of Ormond better than Bridesmaid and all in 
the same way ; but they were so dreadfully 
treacherous and uncertain that many discarded 
Bridesmaid, and nearly all threw the last 
away ; nevertheless, both were better flowers 
when perfect. We do not, however, object 
to Gem coming out as a new flower ; it may 
be useful, but it is not a jot better than Lady 
of the Lake, Miss Vyse, and some other 
light flowers ; it deserves to come out, but it 
does not deserve the praises lavished on it by 
the newspapers. It is, as Mr. Glenny says in 
the almanack, "rather coarse;" which, when 
we look to such flowers as the Standard of 
Perfection, Sir Robert Sale, the Queen of 
Roses, and others that come in the style of 
a ranunculus, and almost form a new race, is 
a fault not to be lightly treated. We do not 
object to the dealers themselves describing a 
new thing in flying colours, — it is natural they 
should make the best of it ; but we protest 
against the praises of needy adventurers who 
are employed on journals, being received as 
any authority, when the facts before us show 
that they assert of flowers what is not true. 
In the list described by Mr. Glenny, who is 
usually looked up to, he precedes the descrip- 
tion by saying, " We have no first-rate varieties 
to report." We read the descriptions carefully, 
and believe they are just, so much so, that 
people who read may suitably make up their 
minds what they would buy. If we could only 
buy one from his description, it would be De- 
light. If we could stretch to half-a-dozen, we 
should add Shylock, Queen of England, Gem, 
Walter Hilson, and Lady Ashley. And if 
it were to be pushed to a few more, we should 
add, Fire King, Jane, Forest Flower, War 
Eagle, Boule-de-feu, and Attraction; we mean 
that this would be our conclusion from Mr. 
Glenny's descriptions. Nell Gwynne, Canary, 
and Mont Blanc, we take to be among the 
