August 24, 1901. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
827 
» Gardening i 9 the prrest of human pleasures, and the greatest 
refreshment to the spirit of man "— Bacon. 
©be ©attuning ^Jlorlir. 
Edited by J. FRASER; F.L.S.; F.R.H.o. 
SATURDAY, AUGUST 24 th, 1901. 
The Editorial and Publishing Offices are 
now at 4, Dorset Buildings, Salisbury 
Square, Fleet St., London, E.C., where 
all communications and remittances are 
to be addressed to the Proprietors. 
NEXT WEEK'S ENGAGEMENTS. 
Tuesday, August 27th.—R.H.S. Committees. 
Wednesday, August 28th.—Henley-on-Thames Exhibition; 
Glasgow Plant and Flower (2 days); Hinckley Exhibition. 
Thursday, August 29th.—Dundee Exhibition; Thame Ex¬ 
hibition ; Stirling Exhibition (2 days). 
Friday, August 30th—Bradford Horticultural Society (2 
days). 
THE STORY OF WILD FLOWERS* 
N a little book of some 249 pages the 
Rev. Professor G. Henslow tolls the 
story of wild flowers, and how their various 
shapes and forms have arisen from simpler 
and less modified ancestors, themselves in 
turn originating from one common stock, 
but when or where he declines to say with; 
out more tangible proof than we as yet 
possess. The story is not exactly new but 
told afresh in the vein with which many of 
our readers are no doubt familiar, who have 
heard the professor speaking, on his 
favourite themes at the Drill Hall and 
other meetings. As the story develops, 
and the roots, stems, leaves and other parts 
of plants are taken in hand, he illustrates 
his narrative with anecdotes and legends to 
illustrate the points he has in hand, to 
emphasise his remarks or to explode 
popular fallacies, which like superstition 
are hard to eradicate when once they have 
taken a firm hold of the popular mind. 
Like bad weeds, these fallacies seem to 
creep along and take fresh hold in other 
soils, while the gardener is slowly following 
in their rear trying to eradicate them, or in 
other words, while the instructor is labour¬ 
ing in a wide field to disseminate the truth 
and explode the fallacies. Some intro¬ 
ductory chapters are of an educational 
nature, and are meant as the explanation 
of descriptive and other terms, in a simple 
way, so as to enlist the attention of 
beginners in natural studies, and enable 
them to follow and understand the subse¬ 
quent instructions and examples of Nature’s 
way in the wide field of plant life. 
Affinities of Plants. —The professor postu¬ 
lates as is now pretty generally recognised 
that plants had a common origin, and that 
the modern representatives are merely their 
modern and lineal descendents very much 
modified. Indeed, many authorities on the 
subject go much further than that and 
furnish, at the least, very plausible evidence 
that plants and animals had a common 
origin ; for many of the lowly organisms in 
certain stages of their existence are indeter¬ 
minable as to which of the two great 
animated kingdoms they belong. Bentham 
is quoted as stating that of ninety genera of 
the great tribe Asteroideae of the Com¬ 
posites there is no decided break separating 
the one from the other. In like manner it 
is shown that species are so connected by 
intermediate forms that no exact line of 
separation can be found. The same may 
be said of varieties, and this we are positive 
* The Story of Wild Flowers. By Rev. Professor 
G. Henslow, M.A., F.L.S., F.G.S., &c. With fifty- 
six Figures in Text. London; George Newnes, 
Limited, Southampton Street, Strand. 1901. 
Price is. 
may be amply demonstrated by anyone 
who likes to study the British Hawkweeds, 
Roses, Brambles, &c. In other cases 
certain plants may be isolated from all 
others by wide gaps that cannot be bridged 
over. This, of course, is due to the missing 
links having become extinct. Indeed, it is 
owing to this fact that botanists are able to 
classify plants at all; and it is due to the 
presence of intermediate forms that botany 
is so complicated a subject, and that so 
many names have been given at different 
times to plants that are practically one and 
the same species. The lack of general and 
wide information in the early days of the 
study was also a fertile source of mistakes 
and errors that education only can eradicate 
and that with difficulty. 
Causes of Variation and Differentiation.— 
The early botanists believed that plants 
were created in certain forms and that those 
forms were invariable. The nicety with 
which plants were adapted to their sur¬ 
roundings was, no doubt, a strong factor in 
fostering this belief; and the fact that they 
were supposed to have been created in the 
places we now find them would exclude the 
idea that they were capable of travelling or 
shifting their places of abode. Individual 
plants were described to a hair in the 
belief that such were stable and invariable 
species, whereas the many additional 
specimens since gathered go to prove that 
hundreds of plants, it may be, though 
varying in minor particulars, are, after all, 
but individuals of one and the same species. 
Botanical books of high standing in those 
early days abound with illustrations of this 
fact. 
The questions have often been asked, 
“ Why do plants vary, and what causes 
them to do so ? ” Plants and flowers have 
been taken from the tombs of Egypt (where 
they are known to have lain for thousands 
of years), and seeing that they are exactly 
identical with species that still exist there, 
they are held up as examples or proofs that 
plants do not vary. While the facts may 
have been true so far as they went they 
were only half the truth. There is evidence 
that the natural conditions of Egypt as to 
climate and otherwise have remained the 
same for a very long period. Such being 
the case it only proves that plants growing 
in the same district and under the same 
conditions for a lengthened period of time 
acquire fixity of form by long continued 
growth under the same identical conditions 
to which they may be and generally are 
well adapted. Plants have within them¬ 
selves the power of becoming adapted to 
environment; for has it not been proved by 
experiment that protoplasm, the physical 
basis of life,is highly sensitive and responds 
to external agencies and causes acting upon 
it. This sensitiveness to outside influence 
enables the protoplasm and likewise the 
plants as a whole to adapt themselves to 
their surroundings, and thereby continue to 
live under the changed conditions. The 
latter in any given locality change slowly, 
and plants gradually change with them; 
and while this process is usually slow in a 
state of Nature, it may and does take place 
rapidly under cultivation. Plants have the 
power of travelling, which becomes a 
necessity owing to the competition amongst 
themselves for the available space, and as 
they go farther and farther afield they 
encounter different conditions to which 
they have to adapt themselves. Varieties 
arise that are better fitted than the rest to 
live and spread under the new conditions. 
Varieties become species in course of time 
by gradual differentiation from their for¬ 
bears. 
Traces of Variation and Change. —Among 
other examples the professor takes the 
Lesser Celandine (Ranunculus Ficaria) to 
illustrate a plant whose ancestors were 
aquatics, a conclusion at which he arrives 
by a process of “ inductive reasoning.” It 
also serves to show how genera are made, 
so that, botanically, it is a very interesting 
plant. By microscopical examination it is 
found that the structure is closely similar 
to that of an aquatic in many respects. 
From this he reasons that the long lost 
ancestral plant took to the water, becoming 
a true aquatic, but after a time the plant 
readapted itself to terrestrial or land con¬ 
ditions, but has not yet been able to throw 
off all its “ acquired aquatic characters.” 
We might point to another plant which 
possesses a dual nature of a more pro¬ 
nounced character than the Lesser Celan¬ 
dine. We refer to Polygonum amphibium, 
which has a terrestrial as well as an aquatic 
form, both of them flowering well. We 
have also seen an intermediate stage where 
half of the plant was in water and the rest 
on land. 
The Rev. Professor Henslow also brings 
forward the Water Lily as evidence 
(“seems an obvious fact” are the words 
used) that petals were formed out of 
stamens, as there is every transition 
between petals and stamene. It seems to 
us that the reverse might just as well have 
been adduced. Leaves existed before 
petals, the latter being only a modification 
of the ordinary green leaf just as stamens 
and carpels themselves are. While we 
admit that it is all supposition, we believe 
that Nature does not always work on the 
same uniform plan, but arrives at the same 
or a similar goal by different ways or pro¬ 
cesses of transition. 
Submerged Leaves of Aquatics. —The 
Water Crowfoot is given as a good 
instance of adaptation to conditions, and 
that the finely divided leaves are the result 
of their being submerged in water. We 
could also instance a good many plants 
that produce these finely divided leaves; 
but land plants in plenty have equally finely 
cut leaves. For instance, Fennel, but 
more particularly Meum athamanticum has 
its leaves so finely ramified that the ulti¬ 
mate segments are almost as fine as hairs. 
Then, again, we have Ferns including the 
filmy Ferns, many land Umbellifers, Com¬ 
posites, &c., whose leaves are very finely 
divided. Seedling Water Lilies including 
Victoria Regia, have their first few leaves 
very simple, but full grown leaves of 
Nymphaea and Nuphar, when living in 
deep water are almost as highly developed 
as the floating ones. In many parts of the 
Thames the Yellow Water Lily seldom gets 
a floating leaf on the surface of the water. 
Amongst the Pondweeds (Potamogeton) 
some of the species have well differentiated 
leaves, but others may have them all 
narrow or all broad in different species, yet 
all the while they are wholly submerged. 
Truly there are many things that yet 
require elucidation. The book before us is 
intended to be purely of an elementary 
character, and so does not attempt to ex¬ 
plain everything. There is, therefore, a 
wide field of research for workers in this 
special department of botany. 
Vegetative Multiplication. —The study of 
different methods of reproduction and pro¬ 
pagation is always an interesting theme for 
gardeners ; so that the chapter on vegetative 
reproduction should prove .highly interest¬ 
ing to them. Many of the instances men¬ 
tioned here are familiar ; but others are less 
known, and a study of the chapter as well 
as the allusions to other methods and other 
plants scattered throughout the book, will 
furnish much food for reflection. The 
illustrations of the method of vegetative 
reproduction in Sedum dasyphyllum, a 
