August ii, 1881 . ] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
135 
&c. ; and again are those which depend on insect or similar agency 
for pollenisation, and though apparently as a result hearing seed 
abundantly, yet rarely producing plants in nature from these seeds. 
Of these last I need only refer to Yucca and Orchideoe as the best 
known of the class dependant on insect-fertilisation. The terrestrial 
Orchide® of the United States mostly fruit in great abundance, and 
there are many thousands of seeds in each capsule ; yet my researches 
have rarely been rewarded by plants that I could believe to be seed¬ 
lings, while in nearly all cases the relation by offsets from a parent 
plant was plain. On the other hand, Orchid locations are declining, 
and Yucca confines its species to comparatively limited locations, 
apparently raising a crop of seeds more for the sake of feeding the 
larvae of the Yucca moth than as an aid in plant-distribution. So 
far aR reproduction is concerned, it will not be denied that millions 
on millions of seeds are created in vain, that thousands of millions of 
flowers bloom uselessly, that volumes of odour and tons and tons of 
pollen are given to the winds and to the insects, without any possible 
benefit to the individual, which could be made to increase without 
any of these productions of no conceivable benefit to the race, except 
as might arise from some imaginary good from cross-fertilisation. 
We see from these simple considerations that sex can have but a very 
moderate relation to the good of the individual or the race ; and we 
may reasonably look about for some more important service which sex 
is to render. 
We find this in variety. This is essential to our present conditions 
of existence. Imagine the higher order of animals increasing by divi¬ 
sion ! Each would be exactly like its parent. Mr. Smith could not 
tell himself from Mr. Brown. But the union of two distinct indi¬ 
viduals, and each individual with varying powers of transmitting 
identity, leads to infinite variety, by which each can clearly distin¬ 
guish that which is his from what is his neighbour’s. Variety is a 
greater necessity to sentient beings than to inanimate things ; hence 
we see that propagation through sex is imperative among them. But 
it can in this respect make no difference to a plant. It is of no con¬ 
sequence to one blade of grass that another blade should be or not be 
just like it, but it is of great consequence to the animal life that is 
to feed on them. Each kind is made to prefer some kinds of fruit 
and vegetables, which must have distinct characters in order to be 
easily recognised ; and hence we have at once a good reason for form, 
colour, fragrance, and the infinite variety these productions give rise 
to. If this view be correct, and I cannot conceive that it can be 
controverted,it puts a new view on modern teleology. In all the dis¬ 
cussions on the various arrangements of plants and animals, we hear 
only of what good is to result to the individual or to the race. This 
is the essential character of the doctrine of natural selection. But on 
the principle that I have sketched out—the principle of variation— 
we see plants and animals not working merely for their own good, 
although that is incidentally involved, but for the good of genera¬ 
tions yet unborn, and in which they can have no interest. Indeed, 
following the inexorable law of variation, plants may be said to be 
labouring to make themselves distinct from each other, so that the 
various animals may be better able to recognise and consume them. 
They must necessarily be under the control and direction of an out¬ 
side Bower, which clearly foresees that there will be mouths, and judg¬ 
ment required to select the food which is to go into them ; all of 
which would be useless unless plants were forced into a variety, 
which is thus to enable them to be the more easily sacrificed when 
the proper time arrives. Of course the selfish views embodied in the 
modern doctrines of teleology must be incidentally true. No indi¬ 
vidual would work unless it supposed it was working for its own 
good. Pleasure must be a condition of existence. This also must be 
a universal law, and “natural selection ” so far to be conceded. But 
this law must of necessity be limited. It is not for the good of a plant 
that it should be eaten by an animal; but it is perfectly consistent 
with the law of universal good that it should have just enough of 
thorns, or bitterness, or some other measures of defence, to keep the 
race from being utteily annihilated. 
May we not conclude from all this that variation and not repro¬ 
duction is the one great law to which we are primarily to refer all 
sexual phenomena ; that reproduction occupies only a place subser¬ 
vient to this law ; and if so, may we not proceed to review the theories 
which have been established under a mistaken idea of the order of 
things ? 
I propose to examine, but I shall confine myself here to only one 
subject; indeed to but a part of that subject—namely, the relation 
which odour in flowers bears to modern theories of cross-fertilisation. 
Mr. Charles Darwin in “ Cross and Self-fertilisation,” chap. 10, 
page 381, says—“We certainly owe the beauty and odour of our 
flowers, and the storage of a large supply of honey in them, to the 
existence of insects ; ” and Professor Asa Gray in his recently issued 
“ Structural Botany,” page 217, follows by observing, “ Anemophilous 
flowers are mostly destitute of odour, and not nectariferous ; ” and 
further, page 218, “ Nor do we know that fragrance or other scent, or 
that nectar subserves any uses to the flowers than that of alluring 
insects.” You see that the idea uppermost in the minds of these 
authors is that some direct good to the plant must be inferred from 
its peculiar form, colour, fragrance, or secretions, and the absolute 
necessity of mere variation is wholly ignored. But we have colour 
and odour even in minerals. We do not look to any special benefit 
to them from these possessions, but we can understand why they 
should possess them under the universal law of variety. Besides, 
odours and sweet secretions are not confined to flowers, but pervade 
all parts of the plant in various degrees. 
The leading veins of the leaves of the Catalpa, as recently shown 
by Mr. John A. Ryder of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural 
Sciences, are furnished with glands which secrete nectar and furnish 
food for innumerable ants. We may agree with Dr. Gray that this 
nectar is for alluring insects, but where does the good in the Catalpa 
come in ? Odour and colour abound in great variety among Mush¬ 
room and fungi generally, and in Lichens and Seaweeds ; have these 
been developed to make them attractive to insects for any purposes 
that we can conceive of in connection with individual good ? They 
have separate sexes ; but notwithstanding their colour and odour, 
cross-fertilisation is not effected by any insect agency. If, as Mr. 
Darwin says, we should not have any beautiful or odoriferous flowers 
had insects not existed, how did these lower orders of plants come by 
colour ? We cannot understand it on any theory of natural selec¬ 
tion, but we can understand it on the basis of the necessity for a 
universal variety in all things. Again, bright colour is not confined 
to flowers. In tropical countries coloured leaves abound, and of 
these the Begonias, Crotons, and Dracaenas of our greenhouses afford 
familiar examples ; and, strangely enough, most of these coloured¬ 
leaved plants belong to classes which are supposed to be anemo¬ 
philous, or fertilised by the wind, and can therefore have no interest 
in making themselves attractive to insects. 
(To be continued.) 
WELLS’S SPRAY-DIFFUSER. 
This, if we mistake not, is a “ Yankee notion,” and was in its 
original form used m American hospitals for disinfecting purposes. 
Mr. Wells, of the Earlswood Nurseries, Redhill, has by sundry 
alterations converted it into a horticultural appliance of consider¬ 
able value. It is much less of a plaything than some spray-dis¬ 
tributors that we have seen, and is used precisely the same as 
a pair of bellows. An insecticide of any kind, and of approved 
Big. 24. 
strength, if placed in the reservoir can be distributed far more 
economically than through a syringe, and is often more effectual, 
as the spray adheres to the foliage like dew, which is not the case 
when liquid is applied through a syriuge. Any insect-infested 
plant in a collection can easily be dressed with the aid of this 
implement, and it will be of even greater value in destroying 
thrips and other insects on Vines where the Grapes are colouring. 
For this purpose this spray-diffuser will be of substantial value, as 
a large vinery may be dressed in a very short time without injur¬ 
ing the Grapes by placing the nozzle between the bunches and 
covering the foliage with, to the insects, deadly dew. We know 
there are many vineries at the present time in which thrips are 
abundant, yet the Vines cannot be syringed because of the ripen¬ 
ing fruit. We have, in answer to letters from correspondents, 
recommended that the foliage of such Vines be sponged ; but the 
insects might in all probability be destroyed much more quickly 
by the aid of this simple yet strong and apparently useful con¬ 
trivance that Mr. Wells has introduced and registered. 
DIANTHUS HEDDEWIGII AS A BIENNIAL. 
Foe cutting or show purposes, since the end of spring, out of a 
fairly large number of flowers in bloom, I cannot remember any¬ 
thing to exceed in beauty the single and semi-double varieties 
of Dianthus Heddewigii. I note the single and semi-double, for 
though larger I do not consider the perfectly double flowers at all 
bright and showy. The brilliancy of the inner petals is lost, and 
rain destroys the blooms sooner. My object, however, in writing 
is to advise those who have not yet grown this Dianthus to add 
it at once to their collections, and to treat it as a biennial—that 
is, not to allow it to flower the first year, but to grow it con¬ 
tinuously in good, rich, firm soil. Although the plants are 
almost perfectly hardy, a slight protection easily improvised wili 
bring them safely through the winter, and the following year you 
will have them blooming some two months before those grown 
