244 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, Jily 17, 1860. 
me a cluster of Lamarque Noisette Rose; it was magnificent. 
Within half an hour I had taken buds from the stem and had 
inserted them in the shoots of a strong-growing, climbing Rose, 
—a dark crimson with imperfect flowers, the name of which I 
do not know. I fastened a label below one of the buds ; no 
other bedded stock stands near. The buds took. Last year there 
were shoots from two to three feet long. I have been to the tree 
this week, and find to my astonishment a large, full-leaved, dark 
Rose—the unexpected result! A side-stem bears flowers of the 
original stock, while my anticipated Lamarque is gone. You 
will say, “ all a mistake.” If so, it is more incomprehensible than 
ever; for I remember, or seem to remember, the whole circum¬ 
stances as clearly as I hope to remember an hour hence that I 
have written to you now.— Kael. 
[We can give no explanation of the supposed change, but 
many stranger things are let loose on tho world of gardening, 
from time to time, than that a Lamarque Rose should turn to a 
dark Rose from having been budded on a high-coloured stock.] 
THE SCIENCE OF GARDENING. 
(Continued, from page 231.) 
No seed ever attains the power of germinating unless the 
pollen from the stamens in the same, or some nearly-allied flower, 
has reached and impregnated its pistils. This was known to the 
most ancient of the Greeks ; for Herodotus relates that the 
cultivators of the Date (Phoenix dactilifera) brought the flowers 
of the barren plants, which they called the males, and attached 
them to the fruitful trees, that their produce might not tall 
without attaining maturity—a phenomenon explained both by 
Anaxagoras and Empedocles, who flourished in the fifth century 
before the Christian era, by claiming for vegetables the same 
sexuality as animals. Subsequent researches have established 
the fact beyond the reach of reasonable doubt. 
In favourable seasons, when genial warmth and gentle winds 
prevail, impregnation is readily affected by the plant’s own pro¬ 
vision. The pollen is never shed from the anther of the stumen 
until the stigma of the pistil is fully developed; and this soon 
withers after the contact. The gaping of the stigma when the 
pollen is about to fall, and at that time only, may be observed 
in the Heartsease (Viola tricolor ); and every morning, on the 
summit of the stigma of the Jacobean Lily (Amaryllis formosis- j 
sima), a drop of viscous liquid protrudes, to be re-absorbed as 
regularly at noon, with the pollen shed upon it, until impregna¬ 
tion is completed : the drop then exudes no more. But, as was 
first observed by Sir J. E. Smith, the process, as it is effected in 
the Barberry (Berberis vulgaris), is the most curious. In the 
flowers of this shrub the six stamens, spreading moderately, are 
sheltered under the concave tips of the petals until some extrane¬ 
ous body—as the feet or trunk of an insect searching for honey— j 
touches the inner part of a filament near the bottom. The irrita¬ 
bility of that part is such that, contracting and thrown forward 
spasmodically, it dashes the anther, full of pollen, against the 
stigma. 
The above are only a few of the modes by which the plants 
are, by their own powers, enabled to effect the impregnation of 
their seed; but where there is any more than ordinary difficulty 
their all-provident Creator has invariably provided efficient 
assistance. The agents usually called in are insects: these, in ' 
their search after honey and pollen, visit the inmost recesses of 
flowers, and bear from the anthers to the stigma, and from 
flower to flower, the fecundating dust. Here, too, we may re¬ 
mark upon another instance of that Providence which makes all 
things fitting and appropriate; for those who have made the ' 
bee their study relate, that though this insect does not confine 
itself to one species of flower, yet it restricts its visits during 
each ramble to that kind which it first visits. How this facilitates j 
impregnation is obvious, when it is remembered that no flower j 
can be fecundated but with pollen from a kindred species. 
The most remarkable instance of the agency of insects, and of 
the artifice, if the term be permissible, employed to render thorn 
efficiently serviceable, occurs iu the Aristolochia Clematitis ,- and 
is thus described by Willdenow. The corolla is tubular, ter¬ 
minating in a globular extension at the base. The tubular part 
is lined with stiff hairs, pointing downwards, like the wire 
entranco to some mouse-traps. The globular part contains the 
pistils, surrounded by the stamens; but the latter being very 
much the shorter, and as the flower always holds itself erect, 
the pollen cannot reach the stigmas, but would lall to the bottom 
of the corolla if it were not for the agency of a particular insect. 
This diminutive visitant is the Tipula pennicornis, which, enter¬ 
ing the tube in search of honey, in vain tries to repass the 
phalanx of hairs which easily yielded to it an entrance; in its 
search for a way of escape it carries the pollen to the stigma, 
and, impregnation being effected, the hairs lose their rigidity, 
sink to the side of the tube, and the prisoner easily escapes. 
The efficient agency of insects suggested that in hothouses, 
from whence they are almost totally excluded, other artificial 
means might be adopted with success to render fertile flowers 
that had hitherto failed in producing seed. One of the earliest 
instances on record of the experiment being tried with a pros¬ 
perous result was on the Abroma augusta, which had bloomed 
unfertilely for several years in a hothouse at Berlin. Tho gardener 
by tho aid of a hah- pencil applied a little pollen to the stigma, 
and for the first time perfect seed was produced from which 
plants were raised. This practice is now very generally adopted 
to all plants cultivated under glass from which a produce of 
; either fruit or seed is desired ; for fruit rarely attains its full size 
if tho seeds within are unfertilised. Thus the gardener always 
finds the advantage of using the camel-hair pencil to apply pollen 
to the stigmas of his forced Melons, Cherries, and Peaches. 
That seed can be rendered fertile by the agency of other flowers 
than their own parent flower has long been known; for it had 
come within the observation of the Israelites some 3400 years 
now past, as may be gathered from Deut. xxii. 9; Jer. ii. 21; 
and Lev. xix. 19; but it was not rendered useful knowledge 
until the late President of the Horticultural Society, Mr. Knight, 
commenced his experiments in 1787. Mr. Bradley, seventy 
years before, had demonstrated that hybrid plants may be grown 
partaking of the qualities of both tlieir parents; but to Mr. 
Knight first occurred tho happy thought that the good charac¬ 
teristics of one parent might thuB be employed to correct defi¬ 
ciencies which would otherwise occur in the offspring of another 
| parent of the same species. Since his time this system of cross¬ 
breeding has been practised by gardeners upon almost every 
genus of plant that comes under their care, and by its agency the 
size, colour, and form of flowers have been improved and varied ; 
the magnitude and flavour of fruits have been increased; and 
tender plants have been made to bring forth a hardy progeny. 
Bradley had only carried out the suggestions of others; for 
both Lawson and Evelyn, half a century previously, had related 
that new Apples ad infinitum might be raised from kernels ; and 
Bacon, whose penetrating eye pierced the most dark recesses of 
Nature, had observed that “ The compounding and mixture of 
plants is not found out, which, nevertheless, if it be possible, is 
more at command than that of living creatures; wherefore, it 
were one of the most noble experiments touching plants to find 
this out; for so you may have a great variety of new plants and 
flowers yet unknown. Grafting doth it not: that mendeth the 
fruit, or doubleth the flower; but it hath not tho power to make 
a new kind.” Our own observations, and those of others, justify 
the following statements as affording some guide to the raiser of 
varieties:— 
1. The seed-vessel is not altered in appearance by impregnation 
from another plant; therefore, no hasty conclusion of failure is 
justified by that want of change. 
2. The colour of the future seed, not of that first hybridised, 
seems to be most influenced by the male plant, if its seeds and 
flowers are darker than those of the female. Mr. Knight found 
that when the pollen of a coloured-blossomed Pea was introduced 
into a white one, the whole of tho future seeds were coloured. 
But when tho pollen of a white blossom was introduced to the 
stigma of a coloured blossom, the whole of the future seeds were 
not white. Captain Thurtell, from his experiments on the Pelar¬ 
gonium, also informed us that ho always found the colour and 
spot of the petals to be more influenced by the male than by the 
female parent. Indeed, all experience proves that the progeny 
usually, though not invariably, most resembles in colour the 
male parent. 
3. Large stature and robustness are transmitted to the offspring 
by either parent. It does not absolutely matter, for obtaining 
this characteristic, whether it be the male or female which is 
large; but Mr. Knight generally found tho most robust female 
parent produced the finest offspring. 
4. Captain Thurtell, from lengthened observation and experi¬ 
ment, ascertained that the form of the petals iu the Pelargonium 
follows most closely that of the female parent. 
5. Mr. Knight says that the largest seed from the finest fruit 
that has ripened earliest and most perfectly should always be 
