48 
DAPHNE FORTUNI. 
subjects of farm-yard, farm dressing, and the 
matters immediately relating thereto, there 
cannot be found in the same compass so much 
useful information to the farmer. We were 
well satisfied with the portion which may be 
called the book ; but the appendix is (like a 
lady's postcript, which is more important than 
the letter,) more valuable if possible than the 
work, yet it seems merely a classification of 
the matter. It bears upon the same subject ; 
it illustrates the opinions ; it is a collection 
of great facts which convince the reader that 
the chapters he has read contain good infor- 
mation, and sound reasoning. We have pro- 
fitted by the lessons we have learned from 
the Muck Manual, — the information about 
guano as well as all other sorts of dressing for 
farms and gardens. The appendix contains 
trials and results of various experiments, some 
very conclusive, others deficient of positive 
evidence ; but the whole are highly useful, 
and will be found particularly so by those who 
have been puzzled by the empty scribbling of 
people who want to palm off what they read 
in works of this kind for their own. 
Glenny's Properties of Flowers and 
Plants. — This volume contains all the pro- 
perties of flowers that Mr. Glenny has ever 
written. It comprises a very plain description 
of all those qualities and appearances which 
constitute the perfection of flowers and plants; 
and by a reference to which, any lady or gen- 
tleman, however little acquainted with flowers, 
may always select the best from any number 
or variety. No person should ever buy a 
plant without consulting this work. 
DAPHNE FORTUNI. 
Daphne Fortuni, Lindley (Mr. Fortune's 
Daphne). — Thyrnelaceas. — This plant is one 
of the recent acquisitions from China. It is 
a small shrub of great beauty, and in the 
garden of the Horticultural Society, at Chis- 
wick, has proved itself to be perfectly hardy, 
having stood in the open border during the 
winter of 1846-7, and retained its shoots per- 
fectly uninjured to the very points. On the 
Chekiang hills, where Mr. Fortune met with 
it, Fahrenheit's thermometer often sinks to 
within a few degrees of zero, so that there 
need now be little apprehension of its being 
injured in our climate, if placed under cir- 
cumstances in an ordinary degree favourable. 
It forms a small downy branched deciduous 
shrub, with thin opposite and alternate ovate- 
oblong and oblong leaves, covered with very 
soft fine hairs. The flowers are arranged in 
clusters of four upon the branches, when 
scarcely beginning to put forth their leaves ; 
they have a slender tube more than an inch 
long, covered externally with soft closely 
pressed hairs, and divided at the border into 
four roundish oblong obtuse uneven lobes, of 
which the two inner ones are the smallest ; 
their colour is a pale bluish-lilac, and they are 
produced in the early spring. 
We cannot discover any evidence whether 
or not this species bears fragrant flowers, 
though, from the circumstance of its near 
ally, D. Mezereum, being remarkably sweet 
scented, and most of the other kinds more or 
less so, it is probable that this kind also lias 
sweet-scented blossoms. Some of the green- 
house daphnes possess the fragrant property 
in a remarkable degree ; and it is also shared 
abundantly by several of the hardy species. 
Mr. Fortune states, that he first met with 
it in a nursery garden near Shanghae, in the 
winter of 1843. He goes on to say : " When 
I returned to the northern provinces, in the 
spring of the following year, I found it wild on 
many of the hills in the province of Chekiang. 
It here forms a dwarf deciduous shrub two or 
three feet high. Like the English mezereum 
it is the harbinger of spring. In March and 
April the flower buds expand, and then the 
whole of the hill sides are tinged with its 
beautiful lilac coloured blossoms, and have a 
very gay appearance. Before they fade, the 
azaleas, as if in floral rivalry, burst into bloom, 
and give those northern Chinese hills a de- 
scription of beauty peculiar to themselves. 
Its Chinese name is Nu-la7i-ee. Like the 
mezereum of this country, its bark is ex- 
tremely acrid and poisonous, and is used by 
the natives to produce blisters on the skin, 
particularly in cases of rheumatism." 
It is found to be very easily cultivated. It 
grows with ordinary care, if potted or planted 
in a loamy well-drained soil ; and may he 
propagated readily by means of cuttings, or 
by grafting on other deciduous hardy kinds of 
daphne. The main points to be observed in 
its cultivation are, to secure it a well-drained 
soil, to expose it fully to the sun when form- 
ing and ripening its wood during the summer 
months, and to give it a period of rest during 
winter when the leaves have fallen : this course 
of treatment will, under ordinary circum- 
stances, result in producing a fine display of 
bloom in the spring. If, however, while the 
same course of treatment is observed, the 
resting state is induced in the autumn, or early 
in winter, the blossoms may be readily enough 
excited to develope themselves, by the aid of 
artificial heat, at any period of the winter. 
There can be no doubt of its forming a most 
desirable plant for forcing into early bloom, 
and as such it will be valuable to those who 
practise the forcing of flowers. 
The Daphnes belong to the natural order 
Thymelacea? ; and in the Linncean system 
rank under Octandria Monogynia. 
