•17() 
ronmoiiYco.MA lanceolata. 
Although the foregoing contains most of 
those worth cultivating that are to be found 
in Catalogues, there are many country flowers 
which will be worth noticing after they are 
proved; at present, all that is known oi' them 
is too vague to he depended on; and there are 
many others, which are merely other names 
for flowers we have already described, or sub- 
jects so worthless as to be unworthy of notice 
altogether as show or bed flowers. There is, 
with some Tulips, so little difference between 
one and the other, and at all times the flower 
differs so much from itself one year and 
another, that it would be impossible to give a 
descriptive catalogue of one kind of the named 
sorts to be at all useful." Our list consists of — 
First, those varieties which are very distinct, 
and requisite to make a good bed of Tulips ; 
Secondly, those which have been thrust upon 
the public by reason of some accidental popu- 
larity, or by means of advertisements, or trade 
catalogues. The object of our description is 
to guide the amateur in the purchase of 
flowers unlike each other ; we are not now 
entering upon the subject of synonymes of 
Tulips ; that one sort appears under a dozen 
names is certain ; but, for the most part, we 
have selected the best name of a flower, that 
is, the name under which it has been seen in 
its best character, and left the rest unnoticed. 
It is not by extending the varieties that we 
make a bed effective, it is by selecting the 
best, and having plenty of them, that we can 
give the highest effect by preserving the uni- 
formity and brilliancy. There may be others 
to add to the present list, even before planting 
time ; because, if we could depend on a list of 
the northern flowers, we should like to see 
them properly recorded. If, however, we can- 
not satisfy ourselves as to the authenticity, we 
shall leave it as it is. 
OLD AND NEW ROSES. 
In contemplating some of the best Roses, 
from the various families, we cannot help 
admitting, that, compared with the old and still 
valued varieties, more than two-thirds even of 
our selections are not so good in character. 
The love of novelty is all-powerful : a shade 
of colour, the slightest difference in habit, a dif- 
ferent season of bloom, an alteration in the size 
or colour of the foliage, the distinction between 
a slow and a fast growth, a longer or a shorter 
branch, have always been considered by sellers 
sufficient to warrant a new name and a place 
in the Catalogues ; and the Rose, unlike all 
other flowers, began with better varieties than 
hundreds of their successors, or rather their 
younger rivals, proved to be. This retrograde 
movement in Roses says but little for the taste 
of the public, and still less for that of the 
raisers ; but the powerful incentive, money 
making, accounts better for the raisers, push- 
ing them off than for the public want of taste. 
Notwithstanding many of the early Roses were 
really beautiful, and hardly admitted of much 
improvement, we had, at a very early period 
of the fancy, such Roses as the Tuscan, the 
Cabbage, the Cabbage Moss, the Maiden's 
Blush, "White Provence, and Double Yellow. 
These have, it is true, been succeeded by a few 
worthy of ranking with them, but they have 
to be selected from thousands infinitely worse, 
and hundreds which ought not, for the credit 
of the raisers' honesty, or the buyers' good 
sense, to have even passed the seed-bed. If, 
therefore, we were to select, to lessen our 
reader's difficulty in choosing, we could not 
recommend them as Roses ecpjal to our old 
favourites; for not one of fifty would beat the 
few we have mentioned, and which ought to be 
the first they purchase. — P. D. 
PORPHORYCOMA LANCEOLATA 
( Of Gardens.') 
THE LANCE-LEAVED PORPHORYCOMA. 
Among stove plants there is scarcely any- 
thing more grand than a good plant of the 
Aphelandra cristata, with its crested heads of 
scarlet blossoms. Lately, a new species, still 
more ornamental, with orange- coloured blos- 
soms, called A. aurantiaca, has been intro- 
duced ; and in this Porphorycoma we have a 
smaller growing plant, of somewhat similar 
habit, but producing rich purple flowers. 
These plants belong to the natural family 
of Acanthacese; which receive their name from 
their affinity of character with the common 
Acanthus, or Bear's breech, one species of 
which, the Acanthus mollis, with handsome 
foliage, is recorded to have suggested the idea 
