158 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, June 9, 1857. 
sotnely by Mr. Pitcher, gardener to Mr. Rucke, whom 
everybody was glad to see in the lists again. This 
group consisted also of fifteen plants, and Lalia purpu- 
rata was, perhaps, the finest plant that ever was ex¬ 
hibited: it had three noble flower-spikes, and five most 
noble flowers on each spike; a new Saccolabium to the 
shows, a slender kind with upright flower-spikes, and 
the flowers of a most peculiar tint of dark red orange; 
a splendid plant of the Cow’s Horn Orchid of Honduras, 
the Schomburgkia tibicinis, with others, all of the best 
classes. 
Mr Gedney came in next with a huge mass of the 
Rhubarb-smelling Dendrobium macrophyllum, Aerides of 
sorts, Saccolabiums of sorts, Vandas, Phaius, Calanthes, 
and Phalsenopses. He was followed in the prize-list by 
| Mr. Williams, author of one of the best books on the 
race. Aerides Warneri, so called after his spirited 
employer, was indeed a great beauty, with two long 
spikes of rosy-lipped, large, elegantly-set blooms; the 
most useful Oncidium ampliation; a splendid Dendrobium 
nobile ; a Sobralia; and others in the same style. 
The well-known names of Messrs. Carson, Keeley, 
Woolley, Green, and Grix followed in this order of pre¬ 
ference, to their great credit, and to our delight and 
satisfaction. Mr. Woolley had a noble plant of Dendro - 
bium Paxtoni , and the lady-like D. transparehs. Mr. 
Keeley had the only Anguloa there, A. Clowesii, with five 
noble citron-yellow blossoms; Coelogyne Lowii, well done 
at last; and Dendrobium clavatum , the finest, or at least 
the largest, flower of the yellow Dendrobes. Mr. Green 
had the only Oncidium Lanceanum. Mr. Carson had 
the only Acanthophippium , a pillar Vanda teres , Dendro¬ 
bium Farmerii, so called after his employer; and Mr. 
Grix had a, ime Aerides crispum and odoratum, and Cym- 
bibium aloifolium , the only one of it there. Mr. Wooiley 
j competed again in collections of six plants with Messrs. 
Jvison, Baxter, Dods, and others; but their luck was 
not decided when I passed. Indeed, after the third 
prize the degrees of merit are set down after my own 
| .judging, begging the Judges’ pardon, for I could not 
await a law decision, and if I decided wrong they have 
only to place it against the old score, and I shall pay 
twenty shillings in the pound when the bread and 
butter are cheaper. Mr. Barker, of the Paradise Nur¬ 
sery, Hornsey Road, competed with the well-known 
and old-established firms of Messrs. Veitch and Jack- 
son, and paid most handsomely for his whistle; but how 
much I did not learn. He had the only Dendrobium 
formosum, a large white; and Mr. Backhouse, of York, 
had the little, lovely, rose-coloured new Chysis Limminghi 
! —what the Doctor said would last in the hair, at balls 
and gallopading, for a whole week. 
After the Orchids commenced the Variegated and 
Fine-leaved Plants. Mr. Veitch cannot be approached 
in these plants unless Mr. Parker will kickover the traces, 
as he threatened to do, both here and at the Crystal Palace, 
coming upon us very much like and before the new 
comet. The variorums from the Exotic were such as 
these:— Aspidistra lurida, Coleus, Dumb Canes, Ana- 
nassas, Caladiums, Marantas, Pandanus, Cissus, Crotons, 
Yucca quadricolor, and the old, but too long neglected 
Sanseviera Zeylanica, which nobody seems to know the 
name of in these days. It is a dart-upright, succulent 
cluster of leaves from a common root, and the leaves are 
variously barred and streaked with green and black, like 
an awful-looking snake or serpent; but they manage it 
too well now-a-days, which makes the bars and shades 
run “ promiscuously.” It would live five or six months 
without water, and then frighten a Sambo into fits as a 
veritable snake. Mr. Parker calls it Dromelia sceptrum ; 
yet it is a well-known medicinal Lilywort with the 
students in Edinburgh, and is next of kin to the New 
Zealand Flax, Phormium tenax. 
Next to these, and in the very place of honour in the 
centre of the amphitheatre, stood the collection of fine¬ 
leaved plants from Mr. Veitch, a complete and shady 
grove of Palms and other-stove plants in the most 
luxuriant health. Mr. Parker, with the spirit of a lion- 
killer, faced these here and at the Crystal Palace with 
true English pluck. His plant of the Fern Oleichenia 
Jlabellata is the finest in the country; his Bromelia 
sceptrum is finer than Mr. Veitch’s Sanseviera sp.; his 
Dragon trees are fierce, fairy-like, and most beautiful to 
look upon; and his Puya Bonplandia is really a 
beautiful Pine-Apple-lookiDg plant, but it is a true 
Pourretia. As we must expect a dash of true botany 
from such of the nurserymen as compete under the 
new brooms of the Horticultural, we must not pass them 
through the mill in false generics if we can help 
it, as we should a green city man or a woodland 
gardener. Agave univittata, in a miscellaneous collec¬ 
tion by Mr. Parker, is really a good dwarf, close, short¬ 
leaved Aloe, with dark green narrow leaves, having one 
band or ribbon of light green up the middle of the inside 
of the leaf. Such plants as this and Mr. Veitch’s Yucca 
quadricolor never die as it were, and are both most 
curious and most valuable for setting off the small 
gardens of rich citizens in the suburbs of large towns ; 
they are never out of place, from the top of the stair¬ 
case to the farthest-off end of the garden. 
D. Beaton. 
(To be continued .) 
A FEW OF OUR NATIVE SPRING-FLOWERING 
PLANTS. 
Again has Mr. Beaton our thanks for calling attention to 
the early beauties of our garden. We must not forget the 
Leucojim vernum , which has afforded us beauty and fragrance 
throughout February, and succeeded as it is by L. pul- 
chellum, just passing away for L. cestivum; and again now in 
beauty is Anemone narcissiflora, with its clusters of white 
flowers, in contrast to the Anemone palmala , whose golden 
and broad, expanded blossoms are elevated a foot high, and 
based by its handsome foliage. Czackia liliastrum, too, the 
St. Bruno’s Lily, graces the garden with its masses of 
miniature white Lilies. Trillium grandiflorum and Trillium 
sessile are yet in great beauty, as are also the Dodecatheon 
Meadia in all the varieties of white and colours. 
Mr. Beaton desires to possess Anemone ranunculoides. It 
shall be his upon a convenient occasion, and any of those 
named in the following list. It is indeed delightful to think 
that some one induces a search for these beauties amidst the 
every-day lamentations of our friends that their gardens afford 
no flowers till the middle of July.—A Constant Reader. 
Tulipa sylvestris. In the woods of Ham Hill, Somerset. 
Anemone Apennina. Woods of Straston, Wilts. 
Paris quadrifolia. At Langrish or Petersfield, Hants. 
Anemone ranunculoides. Woods near Ferrybridge, Yorks. 
Gentiana pneumonanthe , Drosera rotundifolia , Drosera longi- 
folia. New Forest, Hants. 
Colchicum autumnale and white var. Woods of Orchard- 
leigh Park, Somerset. 
Lathrcea squamosa. Rose Hill Park, near Winchester. 
Ophrys apifera. North Rise, Isle of Wight. 
Cypripedium calceolus. Meadows of Castle Howard, 
Yorkshire. 
Dianthus ccesius. Chedder Rocks, near Bristol. 
Anemone pulsatilla. Back of Southdown Hills. 
Atropa belladonna. Woods of Netley Abbey, Hants. 
Eryngium maritimum. Freely upon the shores of Hants. 
“ A Constant Reader” has gathered the above in their 
several localities. 
[Except vernum all the Leucojums are very little known, 
and Galanthus plicatus goes for vernum nine times out of ten. 
Anemone narcissiflora was never in general cultivation, nor the 
true palmala but very sparingly. There is a white-flowering 
kind in July which usurps the true name. Antliericum lili- 
astrum, same as Czackia , used to be very common in the 
