October 23, 1890. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
349 
P RESENT day demands for plants of decorative value, or such 
as will yield a plentiful supply of flowers and foliage for 
cutting, have caused many of the curiosities of the plant world to 
be discarded, and the tendency is to consider them as the lumber of 
the vegetable world. There are, of course, sufficient exceptions to 
this to prove the rule, and it is occasionally the source of con¬ 
siderable pleasure to a real lover of plants to visit a garden of the 
olden type where some of the plant wonders are prized as well as 
those required by the utilitarianism of modern times. It is true 
that in the now popular Orchid family we have a combination of 
structural peculiarities with great floral beauty, but the Orchids 
possessing showy characteristics have gradually ousted from most 
collections such curios as are found in the Pleurothalluses and the 
smaller Masdevallias. One group of essentially peculiar plants, the 
Nepenthes, holds an important place amongst indoor garden plants, 
and most deservedly, for many of them possess a large share of 
unique beauty, though they cannot rank with ordinary decorative 
plants. In recent years also popular and scientific attention has 
been called to the insectivorous plants, the Droseras, the Dionseas, 
and others, with the result that a demand was at one time created 
for “carnivorous” plants, and the inspection of these vegetables 
being surfeited with nitrogenous applications to their leaves 
afforded quite a sensational amusement. These plants, too, have 
been regarded with a species of dread, which a precaution adopted 
at Kew has had the effect of materially increasing in the minds of 
the unbotanical visitors who assemble there on Bank Holidays. 
The portion of the shelves devoted to these, with Sarracenias and 
other plants, has been railed off, and wire netting is stretched 
across to prevent persons of an experimental turn of mind 
practically testing the peculiarities of the Dionteas more especially. 
This has, however, been frequently mistaken for a means of 
protecting the on-lookers from the voracity of such vegetable 
monsters. 
Marvellous moving trees have been described by imaginative 
writers in daily and weekly papers, the Rain Trees have had a large 
share of attention, and more lately the Weather Plant has been 
popularised in a like manner. Still, apart from all these sensational 
plants there are numbers which possess no garden value as usually 
understood, and which yet furnish much interest to the thoughtful 
and observant amateur or gardener. Amongst these the succulent 
plants from tropical and arid climates supply a diversity of strange 
forms, often accompanied by equally remarkable flowers. To the 
Cactus family I drew special attention in a series of articles pub¬ 
lished in the Journal some years since, and reissued in book form, 
which was followed some time afterwards by other works, all of 
which have helped to increase the popularity of several genera 
that include extremely beautiful as well as singular plants. In 
the United States of America, and on the European Continent, 
these plants are much more generally patronised than here, indeed 
the curiosities of plant-life are studied and grown with more 
interest altogether than in this country. With the exception of 
the Botanical Gardens comparatively few amateurs now attempt 
to make collections similar to those which characterised most 
enthusiastic horticulturists’ establishments earlier in the present 
century. Since the late Mr. Peacock’s collection was dispersed it 
is difficult to point to one of any extent, and Mr. C. M. Major, 
No, 530. —Vol. XXI., Third Series. 
Cromwell House, Croydon, is almost the only gentleman round 
London who makes a special feature of these plants. 
The house devoted to Succulents at Kew is the most remark ible 
of its kind that could be seen anywhere ; for while a large number 
of distinct forms are included, many of these, as in the Euphorbias 
and Cereuses, are represented by specimens fully developed to 
show the leading characters of their respective types. They also 
convey a good idea of the appearance these strange forms of vege¬ 
tation present in the countries where they abound. Huge, fleshy, 
leafless stems, often unwieldly and grotesque in the extreme, yet 
producing in numerous cases flowers that absolutely astonish one 
in the production of such seemingly unsymmetrical or even 
deformed specimens. It is singular that plants with abnormally 
fleshy stems are not confined to a few families, though more 
numerous in some than in others, and the development of a thick 
fleshy substance is a kind of protective arrangement adapting them 
for existence under conditions that would prove fatal to many 
plants. 
But all the succulent plants are not giants like the Cereus of 
America or the Euphorbias of tropical Africa ; some indeed are 
diminutive and unpretentious in their growth. Amongst these 
smaller curiosities may be placed the majority of the Stapelias as 
regards their growth, but in the size of their flowers, judged by that 
depicted in the engraving (fig. 41, page 359), they might rank with 
some of the most remarkable plants in cultivation. At the recent 
AVestminster Show a plant was sent from Pendell Court, Bletch- 
ingley, the residence of Sir George Macleay, of Stapelia gigantea, 
and as it was the first time it has ever been exhibited in flower 
in this country it attracted a large share of attention, and perhaps 
a little admiration also. Fortunately it had been very carefully 
covered with a large bellglass, and its odour was thus confined 
to a limited space, for like sa many of its relatives, its odour is 
much more powerful than pleasing. As far as I can ascertain 
Pendell Court is the only place where this extraordinary plant has 
flowered, for though it is found in several other collections we have 
no record of the flowering having occurred elsewhere. It first 
flowered in October, 1889, and has repeated the performance this 
year about the same time. The flower when fully expanded was 
10 inches in diameter, but has had to be slightly reduced to bring 
it within the page of this Journal. It it said to attain an even 
larger size, and one drawing represents a flower 15 inches in 
diameter. The corolla has a pale yellowish ground colour with 
abundant reddish dots, lines, or bars, arranged in a concentric 
manner, and becoming vei’y small and closely placed towards the 
centre, where there is a slight purplish tint. Sir Joseph Hooker 
describes it as “ A native of Zululand, where it was discovered by 
Mr. R. AY. Plant, a collector thirty years ago, and sent by him to 
the botanical gardens of D’Urban, whence it was introduced into 
England by Mr. Cooper.” 
This is the true S. gigantea, but another species is found in 
collections under this name, and has probably been generally 
distributed—namely, S. grandiflora. A specimen of the latter 
received as S. gigantea flowered a few days since in Mr. Major’s 
succulent house, and though the flowers are much smaller than 
the other, not exceeding inches in diameter, they are in some 
respects equally as remarkable. The whole flower has a peculiar 
dark purplish hue, very distinct from most other Stapelias, and 
the inner surface of the corolla is covered with dense haira fully 
an inch long, and forming a kind of velvety pile that has a very 
strange appearance, increased by the fact that the hairs towards 
the tips of the lobe 3 are whitish, forming a fringe. S. hirsuta and 
S. Planti are somewhat like the one ju 3 t d ascribed, and the latter, 
with its pale yellow transverse bars, may almost be considered 
handsome. 
Many other species could be named that are interesting in all 
respects except their odour, and it is not difficult to understand in 
some cases how the term “Carrion Flowers” became associated with 
No. 2195.— Vol. LXXX1II., Old Series. 
