March 24. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
470 
dciilcrs. The Imlbs, on their lirst arrival, look much 
like Crocus hulhs, witli longish necks. Tliey have jiretty, 
wliitc, starry ilowera, and two of them, sjnralis and 
Afro, arc hhisli on the outside, and look very pretty in 
the hud. Vili/iris flowers without tlie leaves like a true 
Amaryllis. Tlio leaves are not much stouter than tlioso 
of very young Onions, hut the most curious tiling ahout 
them is that the seed-pod is buried in the neck of tlio 
bulb, and that is peculiar to all the kinds. No one, in 
this country knows anything of the rest of them, 
oxcejit by report. Masson gathered specimens of three, 
or four more kinds of them; and long ago, there was 
such a rage for nianhers of plants, instead of line flowers, 
that poojile actually marked the names of dead jihints 
in their books and catalogues, thinking they might get 
them before the year was out; and in that way many 
names are in black and white of jilants that wore never 
gathered in a living state. There is an extremely rare 
kind of OethyUis [nndidata), which I once thought 1 
had, but wars mistaken. In the. dried state the leaf of 
j this singular bulb is the, most curious of all the ladbs 
known. It is six inches long, or longer, a quarter-of-an- 
inch wide, flat, and both edges arc waved in-and-out, as 
regularly ns if it were done so with a crimping-iron, 
and on the swell of each undulation there is a hair-like 
I bristle sticking out; and the loaves oi'villosa are as 
full of long hairs as a cat’s tail, and some of them as 
firm as his whiskers. 'J'hcy all do with the same soil 
and treatment as Carpolyza spiralis. 
GLADIOLUS. 
This genus of very curious and very diversified 
originals has gained a step or two in the way of im¬ 
provement at the hands of the cross-breeder, and the 
cross kinds have acquired such a hold on garden jiat- 
ronage, and their culture, propagation, and history, are 
now so well understood, that we see every point in their 
history and management discussed, and that more ably 
and freely than is done for thoTulijr, Hyacinth, orllaiuui- 
culus. Therefore, 1 need not take up time and room in 
' this series ahout tliem, farther than to remark, that wo 
do not owe the success of the crossing in this genus to 
the industry and intelligence of the gardener, so much 
as to the scientific views and precepts of Dr. Herbert. 
; 'The rosidt obtained by crossing Oladioli is only as a 
drop in the bucket to what may be revealed when the 
industry of a generation of able and willing minds is 
brought to bear on the great mass of ornamental bulbs, 
i of which my notes take cognisance of hardly but one 
section—that which contains the half-hardy kinds. 
Before I finish my say on this subject, 1 hope to be able 
to get in the [loint of the wedge, which must, sooner or 
later, split the great stumbling-block which lies so 
awkwardly in the road to inqirovement; and when the 
wedge is once fairly introduced, there will bo no lack of 
strong bcetlemen to drive it on, from time to time, 
until border and pot bulbs become as plentiful as 
blackberries, and as gay as butterflies and moths. 
IIABRANTHUS. 
The genus Jlahranthus is associated in my mind 
with “ Gretna Green.” Not, however, in the way of 
run-away or clandestine marriages, but as being the 
best known point to strangers in that lino which 
se^iaratcs two very distinct races of people—the English 
and the Scotch. What the real difl’eronce is between 
these two races neither the lawyers nor the philosophers 
can tell us; but that there is a difference, and a very 
marked difference, too, no one who knows both the 
races can contradict. Then, if 1 make Habranthus a 
Gretna Green between two races of bulbs, that are quite 
as dissimilar in their ways as are the English and 
the Scotch, and call the bulbs immediately on this side 
of the Green, Amaryllids, and the bulbs on the other 
side of the Green, to a certain extent, llippeasiers, 
how will a stranger know an Amaryllid from a llippe- 
aster? Much easier than he could “ the natives” from 
each other. But this kind of knowledge is not, and 
cannot be taught in schools, or in books; it must be 
learned by that kind of mental philosophy by which we 
can tell two sisters or two brotlicrs in a crowd at lirst 
sight; and this philosopliy is called intuitive perceiition. 
After one knows a good many kinds of bulbs, there is 
no great difliculty in referring a new kind to the gTOiqi 
to which it naturally belongs fiy iWm 2 )erceplion. Some 
kinds of Hahranlhus w'oukl bo I’cfcrrcd to AmarylUs by 
this philosophy, and others of them to Hij^ieastrum, 
by the same percejition. Bo that the line of difference 
between Amaryllis and IJippeastrum is lost in the very 
midst of Ilabranths, and whoever finds it out will 
make a little fortune of it; and the following de.scrp- 
tion of species may help the inquiry, as well as in¬ 
troduce a race of beautiful flowering-bulbs to the notice 
of the reader. 
Habranthus advenus, alias Amaryllis advena and 
llippenstrum (ulvena. —This species is not mentioned by 
name in the Dictionary, but is included under Hisperius, 
which is only a fanciful name given by Dr. Herbert, to 
cover three or four kinds, which, like advena, form 
the western extremity of the genus in Chili—as the 
Greeks and Romans distinguished Spain and Portugal 
as their Hesperia, or the far west. The bulb of adrena 
is dark, nearly round, and not quite so largo as a middle- 
sized hyacinth bulb. Leaves narrow and blunt. The 
flowers come genei'ally six on a scape, bright red, 
with the lips of the segments yellow. Pallidus is only 
a very small variety of this, named by Loddiges, in the 
“ Botanical Cabinet,” and the same variety is caWcdcilrina 
in the “ Botanical Register.” Miniatus is the third variety 
of Herbert’s Hisperius —it has pale reddish flowers, and 
much larger than those of pallidus, but not so large as 
those of adrena, which are nearly as large as a Vahtta 
flower. Miniatus and advena are well worth growing— 
pullkhis is not. 
HA)iRANTHUs Baonoldi.—S o iiamcd after Captain 
Baguold, who first brought it over I'roni Chili. A large 
black bulb, with a long neck, blunt sea-green leaves, 
not more than a fourth-of-an-inch broad—a green scape, 
with six beautiful large yellowish flowers, spotted and 
tinged with red—the peduncles are very long in this 
species, quite three inches ; the bulb is from the southern 
parts of Chili, (Hesperia), and grows in strong or gravelly 
ground, as do the three last, and all of these must have 
good drainage and sandy loam. They all flower in 
summer, before the leaf, and grow through the winter. 
Habranthus biejuus. —From Buenos Ayres, where 
the bulbs are not so dark as those on the western side 
beyond the Andes. Leaves not quite half-an-inch wide 
—four largo dark purple flowers, darker, and lined with 
green below, with the rudiment of a bearded membrane, 
or what 1 call the eye-lash — the very bottom of a 
bulb-flower without a tube, I call the eye—the Nectarian 
membrane, diminishes, in different kinds, till at last 
there is only a ring of it round the bottom, and when 
this ring is fringed, or bearded, as they call it, I call 
it the eyedash as more expressive, and this eye-lash 
brings Habranthus in contact with Hippeasirum for the 
lirst time; and if ever the two genera can be crossed 
together it will bo through the species thus marked 
with a beard, or eye-lash. 'There is another variety of 
this named Uteralis, which ’Tweedie found at Monte i 
Video, growing within the tide mark. j 
Habranthus goncolor. —One of the newest of the 
genus, a native of Mexico, whence Hartweg sent it to 
the Horticultural Society. The bulb is black, the leaves 
broader than in the more southern ones, being fully 
half-an-inch wide, a foot high, and sea-green, and the 
