APRIL. 
101 
But we must return to the question raised by the reviewer,—“ How 
many of these Dahlias could have existed till now ? ” We cannot, of 
course, follow the historv of the identical varieties alluded to, but we 
are old enough to remember them, and also that it was on those 
particular kinds that our own first attempts at hybridising were made, 
and we recollect how quickly improvements were perceptible in some 
of the seedlings, by a tendency to produce flowers more double in 
character, or with shorter petals ; and how gradually the florets of the 
disc became converted into petals, as was the case with the anemone- 
flowered kinds, and full double flowers was the result. An examina¬ 
tion of the florists’ catalogues for the last 20 years will show how 
slowly one improvement has followed another, and that when an advance 
was made in a flower of any particular colour, the rest in that class 
were thrown back a point, and in time ceased to be grown altogether, 
as the cumulative improvements in other flowers rendered them un¬ 
worthy the florist’s notice. “ Nature never advances by leaps,” said an 
eminent florist, the other day, in your pages ; and this is equally true 
of the Dahlia as of the Rose. Taking a flower of any particular colour, 
we find one year a seedling will produce bloom with the same colour, 
but perhaps with a shorter or more perfectly cupped petal, or the 
centre may be fuller and less confused ; by-and-bye the above qualities 
are still further improved on, and a more circular or even outline will 
be the result; or the habit, uncertain in some varieties of always pro¬ 
ducing perfect blooms, will in time become constant in subsequently 
raised seedlings. It is thus, step by step, that improvements in all florists’ 
flowers have been made, and which have led to the qualities which 
characterise florists’ flowers of the present day. Nor is perfection even 
yet attained; the progress with some races—as the Dahlia, to wit— 
may be slower and less evident than formerly, simply for the reason 
that it requires the combination of many “ properties ” now-a-days to 
constitute an improvement, so much excellence having already been 
attained. But let us look at other classes only on the threshold of 
improvement. Take, for instance, the Chinese Azalea, Cineraria, 
Achimenes, Bouvardia, Pompone Chrysanthemum, and numerous 
other families, and see how rapid has been the first progress ; and such 
will always be the case when operating on normal species, or those 
only removed a few degrees from them ; but when a certain number 
of properties have become permanently established in any given race of 
plants, the progress towards the ideal perfection sought after is slower 
than in its earlier stages of improvement. The plants, then, or rather 
(speaking of florists’ flowers), the flowers do not get worse—that is, 
they do not degenerate, as the reviewer asserts, but they suffer by a 
comparison with rivals in advance of them, and possessing properties 
which are wanting in the older kinds. We have the word of 
Mr. Turner, of Slough, one of the first cultivators in the kingdom, 
that the Springfield Rival Dahlia, which the reviewer, as we have 
quoted, states “ was not worth looking at in its latter days,” was as 
good a florist’s flower up to the last as when first sent out; and the 
same excellent authority informs us, as elucidating the point at issue, 
that the Dahlia Sir Frederick Bathurst was so fine it was thought it 
