MARCH, 63 
CHRYSANTHEMUMS. 
LARGE-FLOWERING VARIETIES. 
(PLATE 162.) 
In my short paper on Pompones in the January number of 
Frorist, I said, that as far as my own judgment went, that 
this year would see a greater improvement in the large-flowering 
varieties than in the Pompones; probably the plate containing 
portraits of Mrs. W. Holborn and Arthur Wortley will bear 
me out in this assertion. How is it, perhaps some one will 
say, that with so many new kinds, year after year, we still find 
in the lists of winning sorts at the great exhibitions, such old | 
flowers as Pilot, Vesta, Queen, &c.? Iam afraid the prevailing 
tendency to large dresses and crinoline is at the bottom of it. 
The great object in cut blooms seems to be size, and of course 
completeness of form; and some of these older, and possibly 
not so highly bred varieties, will bear a great deal of high 
feeding, and immense size is attained—while they will also 
stand the gouging and dressing, and plucking better; and as 
colour seems to be quite a secondary matter, they carry the 
day; this will all mght itself by-and-bye. One remembers when 
the outcry was raised about Dahlias being so large, that they 
must necessarily be coarse, perhaps they were, but the 
hybridisers said that; and now we have Dahlias, not only 
large, but quite as refined as the smaller varieties; and so if 
we leave the Chrysanthemum raisers to themselves, we shall 
by-and-bye find the coarseness gone, and the size remaining, 
combined with colour. And indeed when we consider what 
they have done, we may well trust them for future progress. 
I have been favoured during the writing of this paper with 
two plates, published in the Horticultural Society's Trans- 
actions for 1824, to illustrate a paper by Mr. Sabine, the 
secretary, which are supposed to be portraits of the best then 
existing. I wish that I could transfer them to the FLoRIsT, 
that they might appear side by side with this month's plate, 
for it is utterly impossible to convey a correct idea of the 
immense advance. Imagine a large Michaelmas daisy with 
the petals prolonged and quilled, throwing themselves about 
in all directions, feeble in colour, and lanky in habit. No 
change could be greater, and we may well then allow hybridisers 
to have their own way. The great difficulty is, as far as 
colour is concerned, to get a certain amount of liveliness into 
the tints. There is a dullness of hue about most of them, and 
when we come even to the “sang de beeuf,” one is not disposed 
to accord to bullock’s blood anything of a very lively tone. 
VOL. XIV., NO. CXLYII. F 
