





62 THE LADIES’ FLOWER-GARDEN 
seeds, as they vary a good deal, even when no trouble is taken with them, and the fertilisation of the seed is left 
to Nature. When, however, it is wished to raise regular hybrids, the stamens should be cut off the plant which 
is intended to produce the seed before the cells of the anthers have burst. The flowers of the other parent of the 
hybrid should then be watched, and as soon as the cells of the anthers burst, and the fine dust called the pollen 
appears, the stigma of the seed-bearing plant should be dusted with it, and the plants raised from the seed 
produced will be a cross between the two. Some persons apply the pollen with the point of a pen-knife, or with a 
camel-hair pencil; and others merely tie a truss of flowers producing the pollen, to the seed-bearing plant, 
leaving the fertilization to Nature. Whatever means may be taken to produce hybridisation, the seed-vessels 
which have been fertilised should be marked by a piece of coloured thread being tied round the stem of the 
plant, just below the truss of flowers. 
2.—GERANIUM CANESCENS. THE WHITISH-LEAVED GERANIUM. 
Sesciric Cuaracrer.—Stems trailing. Leaves hoary beneath, five-parted, with oblong deeply-toothed segments, Peduncles very long, 
and clothed as well as the calyxes with glandular hairs. Petals emarginate. ((7, Don.) 
Description, &c.—There are two species, the one called G. canescens, and the other G. incanum, which 
appear to be very nearly the same, though the flowers of G. incanum are said to be white, and those of the present 
species are pink. Both kinds differ from the generality of Geraniums in having long trailing stems, and in the 
leaves being covered with a hoary pubescence, which is seldom found in any but the hardy kinds 

OTHER SPECIES OF GERANIUM. 
G, MULTIFIDUM Sweeé. 
The stem of this plant is very much branched, and the leaves deeply cut; they are silky and white beneath. 
The petals are rose coloured, and bearded at the base. The plant is a native of the Cape of Good Hope, whence 
it was introduced in 1825. 
The genus Hrodium has only two or three of what are called greenhouse species, and even those are so nearly 
hardy, as to be very seldom thought worthy of being grown in a greenhouse. 

GENUS IV. 
PELARGONIUM L’Her. THE STORK’S-BILL. 
Lin. Syst. MONADELPHIA TETRA-HEPTANDRIA. 
Generic Cuaracter.— Calyx five-parted; upper segments ending { Filaments ten, four or seven of which are fertile, the rest sterile. 
in a spur, or slender nectariferous tube, running down the peduncle, | Beaks or styles bearded inside, and spirally twisted at maturity. 
and adnate to it. Petals five, rarely four, more or less irregular. | (G. Don.) 
Description, &c.—This genus is divided into fourteen sections, eleven of which are so distinct as to be 
considered by many botanists as distinct genera. In addition to the great number of distinct kinds included in 
these sections, innumerable hybrids, or garden varieties as they are called, have been raised, the names of which 
it is impossible to record, as they are perpetually changing; every gardener not only haying names of his own, but 
raising fresh plants every season, and losing others from accidental deaths, or the plants degenerating in course of 






