142 
JOURXAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ February 25, 1S92. 
pseuio-bulbs a5 large as Walnuts, soft and wrinkled as in some 
Pieiones. Tne leaves are narrow, 6 inches long and deciduous. 
The flosver scapes are developed after the fall of the leaves ; 
they are 10 inches long, hook-like above where the flowers are. 
These are white and clothed with s'^ft hairs on the sepals ; they are 
also fragrant and remain fresh on the plant a month or more. As 
a species B. comosum is a near ally of B. hirtum, a Himalayan 
plant which has been in cultivation at Kew and elsewhere many 
years. It is also allied to B. lemniscatum, the microscopic but 
delightful little species figured in the “ Botanical Magazine,” 
t. 5901. This is noV fljwering at Kew in the same house with 
B. comosum.—W. W. 
THE FLORIST RAI^UNCULUS. 
[Rea-l before the Wakefield Paxton Society, February 12th 1892, by Bev. F. D. Hobneb.] 
When I came to think over a paper on the florist Ranunculus, 
I had fears that it would be short and sad. Short, because 
perhaps but few among us take an active interest in the Ranunculus 
no V, though I feel sure that none will say they do not care about 
it: and sad because it is almost like writing a memoir to think how 
many exquisite varieties of the flower are dead and gone. I may 
succeed, perhaps too well, in writing the shortness out; but a tone 
of sadness I know you will hea", even in the last words of my 
lecture. 
To some of us who have been familiar with the Ranunculus, it 
is only a memory now. and I fear it is certain that most of the 
refined and lovely varieties introduced by such raisers as G-eorge 
Lightbody, Carey Tyso, and Kilgour, are now lost to cultivation. 
My present collection consists of the best which I have been able 
to find, .selected from many poor varieties. In this I have had to 
be assisted by the foreigner, who has on his lists a sprinkling of 
flowers that I feel sure, from old recollections, are of British birth 
and lineage, while a few others may be suspected through the 
thin disguise of a new and foreign name. You may remember in 
Chas. D.ckens' “Nicholas Nickleby,” that a Mrs. Wititterly had 
in her collection of domestics a page boy whom she called Alphonse, 
of whom the author remarks that although the youth answered to 
that name, yet if ever an “ Alphonse ” carried plain “ Bill ” in 
his face and figure, that page was the boy. So also of the 
Ranunculuses I allude to with Continental names—the disguise 
is penetrable. 
Now, even as the manner of man is known by the company he 
keeps, so it may be to some extent with the habits of a plant. 
The Ranunculus family is a moisture-loving one, and the very 
name is suggestive of marshy places, for the name Ranunculus 
is a modification of the Latin word Rana, a frog, and thus at once 
suggestive of damp habitats. 
So in Ranunculus aquatUis we have a purely aquatic member of 
the family, a plant possessing the beautiful provision of a distinct 
and special foliage at its flowering season, admirably adapted for 
keeping the heads of its white flowers above water by buoying 
them up after the manner of a life belt. In the well known Marsh 
Marigold, Caltha palustris, we find one of the Ranunculus tribe 
which may be called amphibious, as living both on land and in 
water, only the land must not be dry nor the water deep. Then, 
again, the common Buttercup and our Ranunculus are terrestrial 
representatives of the family. 
The florist Ranunculus, always accounted of first rate standing 
in the roll call of our old florist flowers, occupied a very welcome 
place in that brilliant and varied company that, passing in review 
before us through nearly all the floral months of the year, began in 
March and April with the Gold-laced Polyanthus and Auricula, till 
the frosts of October cut the Dahlia down. There is a gap between 
the Tulip and the Pink, which the Ranunculus, just happily 
lessened. It is a lonely feeling for the florist to be without 
one of his special favourites in the months when there are 
flowers everywhere ; and so, in my reminiscences of old bygone 
florist days, I recall the memory of many of us who had the 
Ranunculus to unfold her varied beauties just as the glories of 
the Tulip fell. 
It is not difficult to suggest reasons for the decline of the 
Ranunculus, apart from change of fashion, and the rise of other 
recreations than floriculture for leisure hours of young men in 
these days of ball-kicking, and ball-hitting, and ball-volleying 
games and tournaments. I am as far as possible from despising 
any fair and manly game or sport; but I am sorry if a quiet, 
gentle, pure, and refreshing recreation like floriculture suffers in 
the press of counter attractions, and is left short of young hands 
older ones. There is, beyond this, the increased 
ditnculty of finding garden roo.m round towns as easily as our 
fathere did ; and of getting things to grow there as they used to do, 
even if room could be found. You can get outside a big town 
still, but you have to go further than before to get outside the 
radius of its polluted air. There is, however, no real mystery, and 
but little difficulty in the culture of the Ranunculus. The great 
point is this ;—much exact punctuality is required in certain stages 
of its management, and if attention flags, and neglect creeps in at 
critical times, the revenge of the plant is swift and marked, it may 
be even to its own destruction. I can remember that some 
growers never did bloom their Ranunculuses well; and a thinly 
flowered bed is always a discouraging and uncomely sight, since 
the fo’iage of weak tubers is continually dying down, while the 
rest is fresh and green, and proud of the beautiful flowers it 
supports. 
One difficulty with the Ranunculus in our mixture of a climate 
“ in one hundred named varieties,” is the extreme restlessness of 
this tuberous plant. Paradox though it seems to be, our only way 
of contending with this restlessness is to make the Ranunculus 
take a very long rest. It is quiet enough when you have it 
quiet, but the grey silky eye of the new tuber, while it is left in 
the ground, will begin to root very soon after it is ripe, and break 
into leaf sometimes before the old foliage is dead. Some years 
ago I saw in Southern Italy, it would be in February, a collection 
of Ranunculus, among which were Lightbody’s Commodore 
Napier, lemon ground red edged, and a few more florist varieties. 
These plants were one mass of foliage as if they had never or 
hardly ever died down. They seemed exceedingly well grown, 
and were full of stems in bud and a few opening flowers. There 
may have been some of the Turban varieties among them which, 
like the modern French Ranunculus, are too rough and loose for 
anything. 
The foliage of the Ranunculus is our difficulty in more ways 
than one, as I will explain presently. It might pass safely through 
our mildest possible kind of winter, but who is to depend upon 
that ? The dry tuber is a good deal hardier than the green leaf, 
but it is not safe to expose either to frost. So we avoid that by 
plantiug at such a time that when the young leaves appear there 
will, or should be, no sharp frost. I may say that a late spring 
frost will not hurt the young foliage, provided that the morning 
sun does not shine upon it while frozen ; I would not answer for 
the consequences if it did. My Ranunculuses last year had the 
leaves frozen in that Whitsuntide frost, but lying on the north side 
of the Tulip house, they were in shade till they were thawed. We 
throw the Ranunculus tuber into the terrifically long sleep of 
seven months ; but it will awake out of this deep trance quite safe 
and sound if only it has been carefully dried before being stored 
away, and kept cool, out of reach of frost, and not deprived of 
fresh air. 
It must not be placed in any circumstances under which it can 
contract damp ; if it does it will be attacked by blue mould round 
the silky fluff of the eye, the claws of the tuber will drop off, and 
the root is dead. This is a point of the utmost importance, I 
cannot lay too much stress upon it. Storage in paper bags is not 
safe if kept where there is the slightest chance of dampness, and it 
is worse if many tubers are in the bags, as the roots may give off 
some moisture while kept in quantity in a closed bag. I prefer 
the safer way of keeping them in sight, such as by laying them out 
one layer deep on wooden trays, or if kept to name, in boxes like 
those we use for Tulips. 
The best time for planting Ranunculuses is, wdthout doubt, the 
first favourable weather that occurs in or after February, fc-o far 
as the dormant tuber is concerned, it will abide patiently long after 
that without the slightest sign of uneasiness, such as the Tulip 
bulb makes. The Ranunculus tuber will look no worse in May 
than in February, but it will be a great deal weaker nevertheless, 
and the longer it is out of the soil after February, the greater are 
the chances of its not flowering. It will hardly bloom from even 
strong tubers if not planted till, say, mid-April. 
In the necessary process of drying, the tubers have shrivelled a 
good deal, and will swell again enormously when planted, and by 
this means sometimes work themselves to the top of the soil. If 
left exposed of course they suffer, and are liable to be tasted by 
any passing snaU, who, with his sharp appetite, may be looking out 
for the nearest restaurant. A day or so before planting, I wet the 
tubers thoroughly and they quickly swell, and do not lift them¬ 
selves out of bed again. A large tuber, composed of several 
crowns, may also more safely be divided when softened with 
absorbed moisture. In the dry state the claws are very brittle. 
Great care must be taken that none of these are broken off. The 
loss of claws is a check to the plant, and apt to occur when plant¬ 
ing or separating them in a dry state, unless they are carefully 
and patiently handled. 
The Ranunculus is rather particular as to the depth it prefers 
to be under^ound. If this is either too deep or too shallow, the 
new tuber will be formed, not as it should be—a compact group of 
claws immediately over the neck of the old tuber, but of c’aws 
