The Law Of Color In Flowers
from Your Plants
The public are so often duped by a set of travelling frauds, who make it
their business to represent themselves as being the sole proprietor or
agent of some "wonderful" kinds of plants, bulbs, or seeds, which
possess the virtue of being remarkably distinct from anything ever seen
or heard of before, that many over-credulous ladies or gentlemen fall
victims to the unprincipled sharks. Did you ever see any one who could
sell rose bushes that would certainly bear blue roses, or plants of the
Verbena that produce yellow blossoms, or Tuberose bulbs bearing scarlet
flowers? If you have not, you have something to learn, and many have
paid dearly for experiences of this kind.
There is a natural law of color in flowers, that the varieties of a
species invariably present a certain range of colors. To attempt to
introduce a new and distinct color, as for example a blue rose, into a
family where the colors are always white, red, and yellow, is an
impossibility, and any one who claims to do this, may be set down as a
swindler.
Much credit is due Mr. Peter Henderson, an eminent florist and seedsman
of New York City, for the vigorous methods employed by him in exposing
frauds of this kind, whenever his attention has been called to them. We
quote from an article written by Mr. Henderson on this subject, some
years ago: "It has long been known among the best observers of such
matters, that in certain families of plants, particular colors prevail,
and that in no single instance can we ever expect to see blue, yellow,
and scarlet colors in varieties of the same species. If any one at all
conversant with plants, will bring any family of them to mind, it will
at once be seen how undeviating is this law. In the Dahlia we have
scarlet and yellow, but no approach to the blue, so in the Rose,
Hollyhock, etc. Again in the Verbena and Salvia, we have scarlet and
blue, but no yellow. If we reflect, it will be seen that there is
nothing out of the order of nature in this arrangement; why then should
we expect nature to step outside of what seems to be her fixed laws, and
give us a blue rose, etc." A word to the wise, we take it, is sufficient
in view of the foregoing facts.
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