14 
THE AUSTRALIAN GARDENER. 
“ LEEDSIT.—MAGGIE MAY.” 
White perianti. 
ee le 
‘He that hath two’cakes of bread, let 
him sell one of them tor flowers of 
Narcissus; for bread is the food for the 
body, but Narcissus is rhe food of the 
soul.” These are the words of Mahomet, 
and they have been taken to heart by 
Englishmen, to whom D ffodils, 
“come before the swallsw dares,” and 
Narcissi, the poets? type of maiden 
purity and beauty, have become of con 
siderable commercial importance. and 
also as beloved for their beauty and 
fragrance as the Rose itself. 
Of all English plant: .and the true 
Daffodil (N. Pseudo naveiseus) +s wild in 
copses and moist w lx throughout 
thar 
Pale citron frilled cups. 
England—none have been in such con- 
stant favor as the Daffodil, which was a 
favorite garden flower with our ancestors, 
and especially as the flower for making 
garlands. The Rev. Uan.n Ellacombe, 
in his delightful book, * The Plantlore of 
Sha'speare,’ says it has been the favorite 
of all English poets from the time of 
Shakspeare. and even before, for Spenser 
spoke of ‘the green strowed round with 
Daffodowndillies.’ 
The botanical name adopted by 
Linneeus for the whole family of Daffodils 
is of mytholoyical origin. Narcissus was 
a beautiful youth who preferred gazing 
at his own retlection in the water to the 
charms of the nymph Echo, and as a 
punishment for his vanity ne was changed 
by Nemesis, the goddess of justice and 
punishment, into a flower : 
199 
Oe 
* And looking for his corse they only found 
A rising stalk with yellow blossoms crowned.’ 
The praises of Narcissi have been sung 
by the greatest of poets for ages, and the 
flowers have been loved by the gardeners 
of the old country for at least three 
hundred years. Shakspeare, however, 
never saw any flowers such as ‘ Emperor,’ 
‘Glory of Leiden” ‘Ellen Willmott,’ 
‘Maggie May,’ or ‘ Will Scarlet” By 
the side of these his Daffadilly is as a 
stage-coach to a steam engine. 
Over 250 years ago Parkinson had 
anticipated Mr Peter Barr (acknowledyed 
in England as the Daffodil king) in 
employing Pyrenean ‘ root-collectors’ and 
described some hundred kinds of 
Daffodil. The magic art of cross fertili- 
sation was then urdreamt of, and the 
possibilities latent in Parkinson’s store 
awaited the coming of Herbert first Dean 
of Manchester. Herbert, who in one 
January 1, 
_ side of his versatile genius was something 
of a pre-Darwinian Darwin, published in 
1843 the results of his many years’ 
experiments at his Yorkshire rectory at 
Spofforth, and demonstrated that short- 
crowned Narcissi are really hybrids 
between the trumpet Daffodils and the 
poet’s Narcissus, N. poeticus. The first: 
to avail themselves of this discovery were 
Mr, Leeds of Manchester and Mr. Back- 
house of Walsingham. By crossing and 
re-crossing they obtained the host of 
lovely forms now in common cultivation. 
These are being used by the breeders of 
to-day for the further elovution of size, 
form, and color. Leeds sold his entire 
collection for a hundred guineas, but 
twenty times that amount would now be 
thought a small price. The glorious N. 
bicolor Horsefeldii raised by John Horse- 
field, the Lancashire weaver, was sold by 
auction for eigteenpence per bulb. 
Compare with these prices that realised 
by Mr. Engleheart’s seedling ‘ Will 
Scarlet’ three bulbs of which fetched a 
hundred guineas, whilst such sorts as 
‘Weardale Perfection” ‘King Arthur, 
and ‘Hodsock Pride’ cannot be bought — 
under about £18 a bulb, ‘Maggie May? | 
(illustrated) costs 15 guineas, ‘ Duke of 
Bedford’ twelve guineas, ‘Big Ben’ ten 
guineas, whilst no money could secure a 
bulb of ¢ Ellen Willmott.’ 
All Daffodils are not expensive; on 
the contrary, many of the most beautiful 
of the older sorts may be bought for a 
few shillings per hundred. To the 
inexperienced there is little or no diffe- 
rence between ‘Duke of Bedford’ at 
twelve guineas and ‘ Bicolor Grandis’ at 
three halfpence ; they are Daffodils and 
nothing more. But there are differences 
recognised by experts and indicated by 
the prices, and when the enthusiastic 
beginner has mastered the rudimentary 
stages and ‘got his eye in’ he will be ina 
position to undertake the most fascinat- 
ing, exciting, and, in*some cases, the 
most profitable of all operations in all 
horticulture—namely, the creation — of 
new flowers by crossing one sort with 
another, 
