66 
THE FLORIST. 
time prosecuting the study of this tribe, and has also most suc¬ 
cessfully contributed to our store of meritorious novelties; the 
illustration here given is one of his latest introductions. The 
close compact truss of flower, with the foliage on the footstalks, 
denotes its shrubby habit. It is most appropriately named, 
being, indeed, a Gem of the highest order, and destined to be the 
forerunner and progenitor of a race long needed; and through it 
the shrubby Calceolaria bids fair, and with justice, to become an 
important article of commerce. Possessing a double claim, in 
its adaptability to bed and border decoration, as well as to pot 
culture, it also supplies a colour in which all other subjects of 
similar habit and constitution are deficient; and by its brightness 
renders the garden cheerful in those enjoyable summer evenings 
when the sun is sinking below the horizon, and when less gay 
colours are all but unobservable ; it is then, more particularly, 
that the bright yellow of the shrubby Calceolaria rivets the atten¬ 
tion, while the sorts with bronzy, coppery, and crimson tints can 
only be seen to advantage when the garden is less enjoyable, by 
reason of the heat of a vertical sun. 
Raisers of seedlings, and especially Mr. Cole, will do well to 
remember that stature or habit is all in all to the bedding Calceo¬ 
laria, and no amount of well-formed flowers can compensate for 
its absence. We must have short joints and flower-stalks of 
sufficient length and strength to display and sustain a full bulk of 
blossoms against the vicissitudes of wind and weather; to this end, 
also, the orifice or mouth must not be large, or the blooms will 
become so heavy, from their retention of water after a shower, 
as to be unable to maintain their erect position, unless supported 
by footstalks of extraordinary strength. And the larger the flower 
the greater will be the difficulty in this respect. 
Since the majority of floral societies acknowledge the importance 
of the Calceolaria, by inscribing it in their schedules, let us 
oflfer a word of advice: institute a class for each kind—shrubby 
and herbaceous—the one is so readily perpetuated that its recog¬ 
nition as a florists’ flower is universal, while the other has hitherto 
established no claim to that distinction. That property which 
was, until quite recently, peculiar to the latter, viz., its sportive¬ 
ness in giving colours in spots, bands, and other indescribable 
delineations—will soon, nay, already has become an attribute of 
the former also ; and when this quality becomes (as it speedily 
will) more widely disseminated among the shrubby kinds, let the 
annual or herbaceous sorts look well to their laurels. 
The evils which beset the cultivation of the shrubby Calceo¬ 
laria in beds or borders are entirely overcome under pot culture, 
by the protection which glass and other coverings afford; hence 
the necessity for distinguishing clearly the capability of seedling 
