Antirrhinum majus. HY should this gay flower be "Is Winter hideous in a garb like this? The pent-up breath of an unsav'ry To thaw him into feeling; or the smart Although the dragon the flower act of snapping is a creature of the imagination, it is more or less reptilian, and the gaping mouth and huge under jaws of a lizard or crocodile are very fairly suggested in the conformation of the flower. The botanical name Antirrhinum refers to the snout-like figure of the flower, and so we are doubly compelled to take notice of its place in the long catalogue of "mimetic " plants, which are not mimetic, because in their resemblances and reminders of animal form they are altogether passive and incapable of intention. Antirrhinum majus is probably not a native plant, but it is so thoroughly naturalised that it may well rank as such, and it is certainly one of the most splendid and interesting of our wildings. Nowhere does it appear to such advantage as on the old bastion flaunting its gay banner amid grey ruins, or on the old garden wall, where perhaps the common polypody and the wallflower fight with it for the choicer crevices. It has afforded us immense amusement to note the wanderings and variations of the plant. in our own garden. It first appeared on an artificial ruin that was constructed chiefly for the accommodation of sedums, sempervivums, hardy ferns, and the like. On a very commanding pinnacle, one bright summer day, a splendid plant of crimson snap-dragon was discovered, flowering gaily, and seeming to sing "I am king of the castle." The next year there were many such, all in commanding positions, for they appeared to have a gift of geography in finding peaks and passes and table-lands in various parts of the garden. But as they thus spread without aid, and generally sprouting without hindrance, they broke into a variety of colours, and during a run of about twenty years they abounded yearly, and the best of them always were those of a full rich crimson colour and those of a delicate primrose-white or straw-yellow. One day in the latter part of the summer of 1878, we were pointing out to a friend how a number of young plum and apple trees had appeared on the rough brick dome of the stoke-hole connected with the plant-houses, and on looking about we discovered a plantation of dozens of snap-dragons of all colours, all growing, as the little fruit-trees were, on the rough brickwork, without a particle of proper "mould." Here we again noted that the red, pink, white, and brown flowers were comparatively poor, but the crimson and the pale yellow were glorious, both for their fine form and purity of colour. Although from these observations it appears that the plant tends in two distinct directions in its natural variations, it is due to the florists to say that they have produced a series of named varieties, remarkable for the number and size and smoothness of their flowers, as well as for distinctness and purity of colour. We have seen in nurseries collections of over a hundred varieties, embracing all colours except true blue and clear scarlet, and ranging in height from pigmies of four or five inches, to robust plants a foot to a foot and a half high. They are especially adapted to adorn the flower-beds in places where the natural soil is hot and dry, and they make useful bedding plants, because, being perfectly hardy, they need no aid of glass to keep them through the winter. As regards soil, however, they do well on any soil that is not absolutely boggy, but a sandy or calcareous staple suits them best when the question arises as to their proper location. Named varieties are raised from cuttings, and when plants are required for the production of distinct masses of colour, this mode of propagation should be practised. But when there is no special need for uniformity, a pinch of mixed seed may be sown in spring, and the plants may be put out when large enough, and there will be plenty of showy flowers in due time. If it is required to establish them on a wall or ruin, the seed may be thinly sprinkled and covered with a little mould. The best time to do this is when the seed is newly ripe in autumn, to afford the plants a long season of growth before the sunshine persuades them to flower. Mr. Darwin, in his interesting work on "Cross and Self-fertilisation in the Vegetable Kingdom," gives some interesting particulars of the ingenious way in which bumble-bees obtain the honey from the snap-dragon when they cannot push past the projecting lip: "In Antirrhinum majus one or two holes had been made on the lower side, close to the little protuberance which represents the nectary, and therefore directly in front of and close to the spot where the nectar is secreted." In experiments recorded at page 363 of the work above quoted, Mr. Darwin found that while fifty seed-pods protected by a net gave nearly ten grains of seed, a similar number of pods from plants that the bumble-bees had free access to yielded over twenty-three grains of seed. It is not, however, by piercing holes in the flower that the bees effect fertilisation, but by thrusting their way through the jaws of the dragon into the throat, where they encounter the stamens, and becoming dusted with pollen, leave some of it on the stigma of that or the next flower they enter in like manner. |