(1835)  Page(s) tab 1678.  Includes photo(s).
 
Paeonia Moutan; albida plena. Double-white Tree Paeony...
Garden Variety. This noble variety of the Tree Paeony was raised by the Earl of Mountnorris from seeds of P. papaveracea, saved at Arley Hall. It differs from the original in being semidouble, and in having narrower and more lacerated petals. Our plate was prepared from a drawing lent us by Lord Mountnorris, in whose possession the plant, we are informed, almost exclusively exists.

(1837)  Page(s) tab 1955.  
 
....The name [C. coerulea] is, I presume, an unpublished one of Dr. Siebold, the great modern investigator of the noble flora of Japan. Systematic Botanists should compare it with the C. Cadmia of Hamilton, from Mahajur.

(1847)  Page(s) plate 21.  
 
The Majorca Virgin's-bowers consist, according to some writers, of several distinct species, which others, however, regard as mere varieties of each other. In the view of the former the species are four, namely :—
1. C. cirrhosa ; with broad ovate cordate entire or serrated leaves, having sharp-pointed or bristle-pointed segments ; and with a large involucre immediately under the flower.
2. C. semitriloba or polymorpha ; with broad ovate cordate serrated leaves, which are never entire, but generally three-lobed ; and a large involucre immediately under the flower.
3. C. pedicellata ; with broad ovate cordate serrated leaves, which are very obtuse, and often entire ; and a small involucre at a considerable distance from the flower.
4. C. calycina or balearica ; with deeply cut narrow leaves, and an urceolate involucre immediately beneath the flower.

(1837)  Page(s) tab 1955.  Includes photo(s).
 
Clématis coerúlea. Violet Clematis.....Viticella. D.C. prodr. 1. 8.
C. coerulea; patentim pilosa, foliis ternatis segmentis ovatis acutis integerrimis, pedunculis unifloris, sepalis sex oblongo-lanceolatis acutis membranceis margine distantibus.
C. coerulea grandiflora. Hort.
This is a charming addition to the climbers cultivated in England; it has a most graceful mode of growth, and the large violet flowers, with deep purple stamens, are more ornamental than those of any species of Clematis yet in this country.
It is nearly related to C. florida, from which it differs not only in the colour, delicacy, and transparency of its blossoms, but also in its leaves being only once ternate, and in the sepals not touching and overlapping each other at the edges.
The drawing was made last October, from a plant belonging to Messrs. Lowe and Co. of Clapton, to whom a medal has been awarded for it at one of the meetings of the Horticultural Society in Regent Street.
Messrs. Lowe and Co. inform me, that it is, like C. florida, a native of Japan, from which it was introduced to the European gardens via Dr. Van Siebold, and they have no doubt that it will prove as hardy as that species. It is a free growing and profuse blooming plant, and will prove a great accession to our hardy climbers. They received this species with another very distinct one, called Bicolor or Sieboldi, from Belgium in the spring of 1836.
The name is, I presume, an unpublished one of Dr. Siebold, the great modern investigator of the noble flora of Japan. Systematic Botanists shoul compare it with the C. Cadmia of Hamilton, from Mahajur.

(1846)  Page(s) tab 44.  Includes photo(s).
 
CLEMATIS hexasepala. Six-petaled Virgins bower.
C. hexasepala, DeCandolle's Prodromus, vol. 1. p. 5. A. Cunningham in Annals of Natural History, vol. 4. p. 260. Journal of the Horticultural Society, vol. 1. p. 239.
C. hexapetala, Forst. Prodr. n. 230.

Although, in conformity with the authors who have gone before us, we leave this plant in Clematis, yet we do so with a protest against its being so regarded by systematists: for how can a plant with a ternary structure and definite stamens be associated with those which have a quaternary structure and indefinite stamens? For the present the name TRIQUADRIA, expressive of this remarkable peculiarity, may stand as the name of a section; but it will surely be taken hereafter as that of a genus.
It is a New Zealand plant, seeds of which were presented by J. R. Gowen, Esq., in 1844, to the Horticultural Society, in whose Journal the following account is given of it:
"This is a little twining plant, with shining nearly smooth ternate or biternate leaves, whose petioles twine round any small body with which they may come in contact. The leaflets are cordate-ovate, coarsely serrated, and often three-lobed. The flowers are small, pale green, very sweet-scented, and appear in threes or fours from the axils of the leaves. Their stalks are long and hairy, and each has a pair of small bracts below the middle. The sepals are very uniformly six in number, of a narrowly oblong form, and spreading so as to form a small green star. Contrary to the usual structure of the genus, the stamens are constantly six only in number, and about half as long as the sepals.
The late Mr. Allan Cunningham gathered it in the northern island of New Zealand, but it was first found by Sir Joseph Hunks in 1769, and a drawing of it is said to be preserved in the Banksian Library.
"It is a hardy greenhouse plant, requiring a light loamy soil to grow in, and is easily increased by cuttings of the half ripened wood. It only requires the protection of a cold pit or frame during winter, and flowers abundantly in April.
"Although its blossoms are green and inconspicuous, it is far from an unimportant species, on account of its blooming freely, and being very sweet-scented."

(1839)  Page(s) plate 61.  Includes photo(s).
 
Clematis lathyrifolia. Large-flowered erect Clematis...
C. lathyrifolia; herbacea, erecta, foliis pinnatis: foliolis ovato-lanceolatis integerrimis 2-3-lobisve, corymbis paniculatis, sepalis 4-5 obovatis tomentosis, carpellis cum cauda villosis.
C. lathyrifolia. Besser. sec. Reichenbach fl. excurs. germ. 2. 734.

The two common hardy herbaceous plants, Clematis erecta and angustifolia, although placed at a great distance from each other in M. DeCandolle's distribution of the genus, are nevertheless so nearly related that there can be no doubt of their immediate affinity. In fact they cannot be distinguished by the characters given them in the Prodromus, which are almost equally applicable to either. C. angustifolia is said to have one flower only on a common stalk, which is never the case in the garden specimens, neither do I find it so in my wild specimens of the supposed variety C. lasiantha from Dahuria. The real distinction between them consists, as Reichenbach has well observed, in the narrow leaves and hairy carpels of one, as compared with the broad ovate leaves and smooth carpels of the other.
But to which are we to refer the present plant? Reichenbach considers it a mere variety of C. erecta, which is impossible, for it has the leaves and fruit of C. angustifolia ; but it will not arrange exactly with the latter plant, for its flowers are in a loose corymbose panicle, and are much larger, and its whole aspect is different; in the size of its flowers it corresponds with the above-mentioned C. lasiantha, which seems a good species, and not a mere variety of C. angustifolia. This may indeed be regarded as a variety of C. lasiantha; but it wants the wool in which the flower-buds of that species are enveloped.
What its native country may be I am unable to ascertain; it is said by Reichenbach to have received its name from Professor Besser; but it is not noticed in that writer's Enumeration of the plants of Podolia, Bessarabia, and other dismemberments of the ancient kingdom of Poland, nor do I find a trace of it in any book except Reichenbach's Enumeration, above quoted.
I have only seen it in the garden of the Horticultural Society, where it was received from the late Mr. Fischer, of the Gottingen garden, under the name here adopted.
It is a very showy hardy perennial, growing three or four feet high in any good garden soil, and flowering freely from June to August.
It is increased freely by division of the old plant when in a dormant state, or by seeds, which should be sown in the spring; the seedlings will not flower before the second season.
It is rather a straggling plant if left to nature; but if tied up regularly to a stake, it makes a beautiful object in a flower garden.

(1840)  Page(s) plate 53.  Includes photo(s).
 
Clematis montana Mountain Clematis. Polyandria Polygynia...
C. montana; pedunculis 1-floris, involucre nullo, foliis temati-sectis segmentis oblongis acuminatis subtrifidis grosse serratis. DeCand. syst. 1. 164. prodr. 1. 9.
C. anemoniflora. Don Prodr. fl. nep. 192. fide Royle.
According to Dr. Royle, Clematis grata from its fragrance, and C. montana from the showy nature of its garlands of numerous white rose-like flowers, are the most desirable of the Himalayan species of this charming genus as ornamental plants. Certainly nothing can well be more beautiful than the latter, of which a figure is now given; for in the month of May, or even in April, on the south coast of England, it is one mass of the most brilliant snow-white blossoms tinged with a delicate pink.
It is a species of the Flammula section, and not at all related to that called Cheiropsis, in which by some mistake it was stationed by DeCandolle.
It is a hardy climber, flowering in May, and requiring the same treatment as the other hardy kinds of Clematis.
It strikes freely from cuttings of the half-ripe wood, and grows very rapidly if planted in any strong rich soil. It is therefore well adapted for covering arbours, the flowers being sweet scented and produced earlier than any of the other hardy species.
It was first brought from India by Lady Amherst, and distributed under the name Clematis odorata, a name it still retains in some collections. The accompanying drawing was made in the Garden of the Horticultural Society in May last.

(1847)  Page(s) plate 21.  Includes photo(s).
 
Clematis pedicellata. Long-stalked Majorca Virgin's Bower...
Section Cheiropsis. Stems climbing. Flowers solitary, with an involucre formed by the union of a pair of bracts below the flower. Petals none. Fruits with long feathery tails.
C. pedicellata ; foliis fasciculatis ovatis cordatis integris serratis trilobis ternatisque obtusis mucronulatis, involucro parvo a flore distante, sepalis rotundatis.
С. cirrhosa pedicellata, DeCand. prod. 1. 9.

The Majorca Virgin's-bowers consist, according to some writers, of several distinct species, which others, however, regard as mere varieties of each other. In the view of the former the species are four, namely :—
1. C. cirrhosa ; with broad ovate cordate entire or serrated leaves, having sharp-pointed or bristle-pointed segments ; and with a large involucre immediately under the flower.
2. C. semitriloba or polymorpha ; with broad ovate cordate serrated leaves, which are never entire, but generally three-lobed ; and a large involucre immediately under the flower.
3. C. pedicellata ; with broad ovate cordate serrated leaves, which are very obtuse, and often entire ; and a small involucre at a considerable distance from the flower.
4. C. calycina or balearica ; with deeply cut narrow leaves, and an urceolate involucre immediately beneath the flower.

On the other hand, Cambessédes, who studied them in the Balearic islands, came to the conclusion that they are all mere varieties of one common type. " In general," he says, " when Cl. cirrhosa grows in the plains of Majorca, near Palma, Campos, Arta, Alcudia, Pollenza, its leaves are nearly entire, or slightly saw-toothed ; but when it reaches the mountains of Esporlas, Valdemosa, &c. the leaves become gradually three-lobed, palmated, or almost digitate. I possess several specimens which I gathered on the top of Puig-major, twelve hundred yards above the sea, in which the leaves are not only palmate, but their segments are divided, nearly to the base, into narrow almost linear and toothed divisions."
When those who study these plants in their native places are unable to agree as to their distinctness, we, who know them only in cultivation, may be pardoned if, for the sake of convenience at least, we regard them as so many species. C. pedicellata does, in fact, seem very different from C. cirrhosa, if C. semitriloba does not ; for its very blunt leaves, its small involucre at a considerable distance from the flower, and the small size of the flower itself, are remarkable. We have it wild from Sardinia under the name of C. balearica, with its garden peculiarities.
It is a tolerably hardy climbing shrub, which is only injured by such winters as that of 1837-8, and well suited for training on low walls or trellis, as it is not a very rapid growing kind. It thrives in any good loamy soil, is increased by cuttings of the half-ripened wood, treated in the usual way, and flowers twice during the year, namely, in spring and autumn.
It was presented to the Horticultural Society several years ago, by Messrs. Lee, of the Hammersmith Nursery.

(1839)  Page(s) pl. 61.  
 
[From the text to C. lathyrifolia]
The two common hardy herbaceous plants, Clematis erecta and angustifolia, although placed at a great distance from each other in M. DeCandolle's distribution of the genus, are nevertheless so nearly related that there can be no doubt of their immediate affinity. In fact they cannot be distinguished by the characters given them in the Prodromus, which are almost equally applicable to either. C. angustifolia is said to have one flower only on a common stalk, which is never the case in the garden specimens, neither do I find it so in my wild specimens of the supposed variety C. lasiantha from Dahuria. The real distinction between them consists, as Reichenbach has well observed, in the narrow leaves and hairy carpels of one, as compared with the broad ovate leaves and smooth carpels of the other.

(1846)  Page(s) tab 60.  
 
CLEMATIS crispa. The crisp-flowered Clematis.
C. crispa; foliolis supremis linearibus lanceolatisve integerrimis bilobisque infimis subrotundis nunc trilobis, sepalis coriaceis medio constrictis apice recurvis crispatis, achaeniis maturis brevi-caudatis eplumosis.
C. flore crispo, Dill. elth. 1. t. 73.
C. crispa, Linn. sp. pl. 765. DeCand. Syst. 1. 162.

The plants cultivated in gardens, or mentioned by modern authors under the names of C. Viorna, crispa, reticulata, cylindrica, rosea, &c, present a scene of confusion such as is rarely seen even among Botanical compilations. Every body has every one of these things, but each has something different from his neighbour. This has arisen from the unskilful, not to say careless, manner in which the modern writers on Clematis have fulfilled their task.
Let us take C. Viorna as an example. This common plant, well known to the old writers, and perfectly distinguished by its small leathery dull brownish purple flowers, is well represented by Jacquin, in his Eclogues, who understood the force of Ray's definition, "purpurea, repens, petalis florum coriaceis." It was, however, miserably characterized by Linnaeus, and hence the confusion that has attended its history. For instance, the great purple-flowered species, now called C. Hendersonii, was figured for it in Andrews's Repository; and Torrey and Gray quote, as its synonym, the C. cordata of the Botanical Magazine, which has as little resemblance to it.
What this C. cordata may be does not clearly appear; it is probably the same as a plant subsequently figured in the Botanical Magazine under the name of C. crispa, but so bad a representation as to be unworthy of citation, and certainly having nothing to do with C. crispa. Sweet fancied it to be a new species, and called it C. Simsii, in which he is followed by Loudon. Sir Win. Hooker refers it to C. reticulata, and he is doubtless right.
This reticulata originated with Walter, whose authentic specimen was examined by Dr. Asa Gray, and the definition of the latter botanist, in the " Flora of North America," may be accepted as expressing the real character of the species. Taken along with Elliott's description of C. reticulata, which Torrey and Gray quote as a true synonym, as it surely is, it is clear that the C. reticulata is a Texan plant, in our herbarium, remarkable for its netted leaves, and pretty well represented in the Botanical Magazine. Yet the plant figured under the name of C. reticulata, in Watson's Dendrologia Britannica, t. 72, has no resemblance to the real plant, but is one of the garden varieties of C. Viticella. It is, therefore, unfortunate that Mr. Loudon should have selected that figure to represent C. reticulata, at the same time copying Sims's figure of the real reticulata for C. Simsii.
The Clematis cylindrica of the Botanical Magazine is a puzzle. It has long cylindrical flowers, with a pale narrow flat edge, a tapering point, and an intensely purple colour, and with very narrow linear lanceolate leaves. According to Dr. Sims, it is the same as the false Viorna, figured in the Botanist's Repository, and above referred to; but that plant is surely what is called C. Hendersonii in the gardens, with flowers spreading flat, and very broad leaves, the uppermost of which are simple. We must, therefore, leave the false Viorna out of consideration. Torrey and Gray say, that C. cylindrica is the same as what Elliott calls crispa, but it agrees with that author's description in little of importance except its bright purple flowers; besides, he has a CI. cylindrica as well, and that cylindrica is evidently the plant of the Botanical Magazine. DeCandolle referred to C. cylindrica the CI. divaricata of Jacquin's Eclogues, but that plant has very short flower-stalks, smaller and paler flowers, and is an erect, or suberect species. It can have nothing to do with the scrambling C. cylindrica. Upon the whole, we are unable to point with confidence to any garden plant which well agrees with the account in the Botanical Magazine. There is a pale flowered species in cultivation which may he it, but if so, the original figure is little trustworthy.
The last of these perplexed species is C. crispa. The authority for the name, and its origin, are to be found in the "Hortus Elthamenis," where it is figured and well described by Dillenius under the name of C. fiore crispo. It has the narrow upper leaves ascribed to C. cylindrica, some 3-lobed leaflets among the lower parts of the branches, and flowers as large as those of the latter species, pale purple, slightly sweet-scented, and much contracted before the sepals roll backward, so that it has a conical tube; or as Dillenius well puts it, the flowers are "oblongi, tubulosi, ad basim crassiores, medium versus angustiores et veluti clausi." Add to which it has the short-tailed mucronate fruit of C. campaniflora. It was raised in Sherard's garden from seeds obtained from Carolina. That it is a very peculiar species there can be no doubt, and upon Dillenius's figure and description full reliance may evidently be placed. Nevertheless a bad figure of a totally different plant, having all the appearance of Clematis reticulata, was produced for it in the Botanical Magazine, and copied into Loudon's Arboretum; and Torrey and Gray describe it as a plant with flowers a third smaller than in C. Viorna, and bright purple; yet they quote to C. Viorna itself the C. cordata of the Botanical Magazine, which is not distinguishable from the false crispa of the same work; and the latter is quoted by them to C. crispa, although it has pale pink flowers, much larger than in Viorna, and of the same size as those of the false synonym of C. Viorna above referred to. And then in their supplement they declare that Elliott's C. crispa is not crispa at all, but C. cylindrica. In the midst of all this confusion there is nothing for us to do but to go back to the original source of the name, and to determine what Sherard's plant really was, leaving other critics to settle the modern synonyms if they can.
We entertain no doubt that the species now produced is that of Dillenius, with whose account it exactly agrees. The sweet-scented flowers, pale purple, and contracted in the middle, the crisp edge of the sepals, the long, narrow, upper leaflets are all characteristic, and the condition of the fruit, which we have not seen more than three-quarters ripe, is not at variance with it. It has been reintroduced to gardens by Messrs. Maule and Sons of the Stapleton Road Nurseries, Bristol, to whom we are indebted for our specimens. It was raised by them from North American seeds marked "A new sweet-scented Clematis," and it well deserves that name, for its fragrance is most agreeable especially towards evening. It flowers incessantly during all the summer, that is to say from May to October, and it seems likely to go on blooming as long as it remains in a growing state; on account of its constant flowering we had called it C. semperflorens, until we ascertained that it was the real old long lost C. crispa. It is in all respects a charming hardy species.
The conclusion to which the previous discussion leads may be briefly stated thus :—
The true C. Viorna is that of Jacquin.
C. reticulata bears also the names of C. cordata, crispa, and Simsii.
C. cylindrica, as figured in the Botanical Magazine, is a doubtful species, open to future enquiry.
C. crispa is quite distinct from the preceding, and is the plant now figured.
Moreover C. crispa of the Botanical Magazine is C. reticulata, if anything. C. cordata of the same work is certainly reticulata. C. Viorna of the Botanist's Repository is C. Hendersonii. C. Simsii is C. reticulata. C. reticulata of the Botanist's Repository is a Viticella. C. divaricata does not even belong to the division of the genus now under consideration, although quoted to C. cylindrica.