l(i 2 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
Juke 10. 
ninepence to anybody else, unless it were in a large pot, 
which would pay part of the expense when the plant 
was thrown away. Prince Arthur was by far the best 
un-florist cineraria there; as at Chiswick, then Carminette, 
after that Angelique and Amy Robsart. These were the 
only crimson shades. For dark purple we had three— 
good, better, and best—or Wellington, Bessy, and Mrs. 
Sidney Herbert. There were six kinds of those pretty 
white-eyed, daisy-looking kinds, with bright red edges, or 
tips, which are the greatest favourites with most ladies. 
Their merit is as they stand here:—1, Wedding ring; 
2, Climax; 3, Rosy morn; 4, Charles Kean; 5 , Mrs. 
Sidney Herbert; and 0, Pieturata, a seedling which 
had no prize of course, because it was pretty. I said 
the great bulk were white and blue-edged, or with a 
faintish purple edge. Out of scores of this stamp, Lady 
Hume Campbell and Effie Deans were the only two 
that I would grow; and were it not for one of the names 
(I do not mean Etfie), I am not sure that I would grow 
any of the lot. But I owe more than respect to Lady 
Hume Campbell, for I owe her ladyship the first good 
white scarlet geranium that I can raise, in exchange for 
the first white variety of the scarlet breed I ever saw— 
the Zona-le-alba, of Sweet. Annie is rather pretty, white 
centre, purple tips, and a reddish shade between. White 
Perfection is white all over, centre and all, and Queen of 
Beauties, the same, except the centre or eye, like those 
of Black-eyed Susan; these two would make white beds 
in a shaded situation, or where the sun did not reach 
them in the height of the day. Cerito was much cried 
up these three or four years past, but I do not like it at 
all; looks pale and sickly, like Charley after having a 
drop too much. But talk of pale faces after artificial 
stimulants, there were two large pots here, in the rose 
tent, filled with one of the richest flowers we have at this 
season, Cheiranthus Marshallianus. I said, the other 
day, how well it would do for a bed at the end of the 
spring, and here was a proof; two whole beds could 
be made out of these two beautiful specimens; but, alas! 
they were not better than Cerito, they had too much 
heat, and were spoiled in the cooking. But still our 
point is gained, just as well as if those had a gold 
medal; beds this plant will assuredly make, and fine 
specimens too for the conservatory in May, when yellow 
flowers are scarce, only let them be in their flowering- 
pots by the end of September for the first crop; the 
second, shift finally about the middle of February; and 
if tbere bo a third succession, pot a month later, and 
keep the plants quite out-of-doors, and none of them 
will force except at the expense of colour. 
Messrs. Standisli and Noble, of Bagshot, had their 
beautiful new Azalea amcena here, and in better condi¬ 
tion than I have yet seen it. A student of the great 
Linnaeus would drive it far away from all the heathworts 
after counting the stamens, which number but five in 
this beauty, so that wo have now five, eight, and ten 
stamens in wild species of this one genus alona; but 
then, the position of the stamens, on which so rnuch 
stress is laid in “natural arrangements,” is just as fickle 
in some orders and genera as their number is in this. 
In the florists’ Pelargoniums, the best new one by 
far at this exhibition was a seedling by Mr. Hoyle, called 
Basilisk. This is the very first seedling that has been 
got in my time. Incomparable and Magnet, it will be 
recollected, were my favourites of all those at the first 
Chiswick Show; Basilisk is now before them in my esti¬ 
mation ; but as all fancies in flowers depend on rules 
without laws, or, rather, on rules founded on arbitrary 
laws, I must qualify my assertions so far as to say, that 
I have really no dependance on my own judgment in 
those things, therefore my opinions, whether right or 
wrong, are borrowed from others, principally from ladies, 
for the last twenty years; and I had so much practice, 
that I could tell to a shade the first plant that nine 
ladies out of ten would mark out of a thousand. If a 
large tent was filled with geraniums of all the sorts, I 
am quite sure Basilisk would attract more attention 
than any one else ; then, up to this time, the high- 
coloured geraniums stand thus— Incomparable, good, 
Magnet, better, and Basilisk, best; but there is some 
hitch in the rotundity of Basilisk, or in the profundity 
of the florist, and they give it no shelter nor prize; still 
they are quite right, if they have laws, let them be ever 
so bad, they would be worse if they did not live up to 
them; and all that we insist on is, the colour, or com¬ 
binations of colour, take the first prize; substance the 
second prize; and the power to withstand the sun the 
third and last prize. Who would award a first prize to a 
round, or, if they will, a perfectly circular flower-garden, 
if it was planted all over with mignonette, or heliotrope, 
or even with variegated geraniums ? Basilisk is a clear 
light scarlet, with less black in the upper petals than 
any of them. The new dark blotch, once so much ad¬ 
mired, is washed out, and the old streakiness, so pre¬ 
valent between 1820 and 1830, reappears, but not in 
the old starry fashion, the streaks are collected together, 
and occupy the bottom of the place where the blotch 
stood; get rid of these veins altogether, and out comes 
ne plus ultra at last. These large geraniums were 
remarkably well staged at this exhibition; the plants 
were not so outrageously large as you sometimes see 
them, and all the better, I think; they were never se6n 
in better health or bloom, and there were an endless 
number and variety of them. 
Fancy Geraniums. —We ought to have a change in 
the way of showing this new class; of that I am more 
convinced every show I attend. The fancies will not 
submit to the rules of the professed florist, and if they 
did, they would lose much of their interest in the eyes of 
the public, especially the ladies; then, as matters now 
stand, public taste and the taste of the florist are 
pitted against each other in the geranium tent, that is, 
the strong against the weaker party, to the latter’s pre¬ 
judice. Now, although it is fair and lawful game to 
endeavour to laugh out of countenance the odd fancies 
of a brother, it is a very different thing to take advantage 
of his odd ways to his prejudice; therefore, the fancy 
geraniums ought to bo placed in a tent by themselves, 
as far away from the large ones as can be done; so that 
by passing through intervening tents, the impression 
left by one class of geraniums might be blunted, as it 
were, before you enter the second geranium tent. The 
fancies were much finer and more numerous at this 
show than at Chiswick; the best sketch I could make 
of them was this:—Lightest sorts—1, Queen Superb; 
2, Empress; 3, Queen Victoria. Those like Ibrahim 
Pacha —1, Duchess d'Aitmale; 2, Orestes; 3, Minerva; 
but too near No. 1 to be kept in a select collection. 
The higher-coloured ones with light fronts, as Heine de 
France, stood thus—1, Alboni; 2, Fairy Queen; 3, Odo- 
rata magniflora; 4, Reine de France; 5, Modesta; and 
0, Erubesccns ; all these were exceedingly gay and beau¬ 
tiful. Were it not that they would pull my ears for 
occupying too much space, I would run out this “ run¬ 
ning commentary,” as they call it, to a much greater 
length, but my notes will come in for future pegs to 
hang my “pot hooks” on. D. Beaton. 
ECONOMICAL HOUSES. 
“ What's in a name ? ” asked a great man. Almost 
everything in a commercial and novelty point of view 
with us ticklish folk, whether Saxon or Celt. I would 
not disparage in the least the beautiful geraniums sent, 
and sending out by the Messrs. Lee— The Flower of the 
Day, and The Mountain of Light —though some will say 
the first is flabby, and that the second is too shy for a 
