Plate 65 . 
CLIMAX RHODODENDRON. 
Rhododendron catawhiense* (hyb.J. 
Many persons when they hear of a successful raiser of seed¬ 
lings call him fortunate, and suppose that it is entirely the re¬ 
sult of chance; and that he wdio secures the largest quantity 
of seed will obtain the largest number of valuable varieties. 
This is entirely a mistake. It is very true that many excellent 
seedlings were the result of pure chance, as far as the raiser 
-was concerned, as e.g. Lord Raglan Verbena (still much es¬ 
teemed, although an old flower), came up in the walk of Mr. 
Banks’s garden at Sholden; but it is not true that science and 
skill have nothing to do with it in general. No flower has pro¬ 
bably been more skilfully hybridized, or been more docile under 
its treatment, than the Rhododendron; and w r e cannot do bet¬ 
ter than give, in the words of the raiser of the beautiful variety 
figured in our Plate, the manner in wdiich his success has been 
obtained. Our valued friend Mr. Standish, of Bagshot, says :— 
“ Twenty-five years ago I found that all the hybrids raised be¬ 
tween Rhododendron arboreum and the different hardy species 
were either too tender or bloomed too early in the spring to be 
of any use as out-of-door plants, so I set to work in order to have 
them more hardy, and have succeeded quite to my expectation. 
I have found from my various crosses that, by breeding in and in, 
or for several crosses all from the same line, although they were 
bred from two distinct plants, and although I obtained good 
free bloomers and fine colours, still, being in the same line, 
I obtained diseased constitutions, and in many instances the 
plants would scarcely grow. Since then I have been breeding 
* It is very difficult to give an accurate botanical description of these hybrid 
garden flowers, as the blood of so many species enters into them. 
