Henry Noel Humphreys

“ In some of these Etruscan sepulchres, the dead who had lain undisturbed perhaps for thirty centuries, were found still wearing almost the aspect of life, and still clothed in the dresses they had worn when living. The bodies—that crumbled on the first rude touch—were still decorated with these gold jewels of the tomb, massive in appearance but thin as gauze, and which were manufactured expressly to replace the more solid ones, which were in some cases removed after the ceremony of interment was over. ”

“ I know of a recent instance in which an amateur of dahlias, naturally wishing to produce dahlia flowers of a blue colour, hitherto found imposible, placed half a pound of French ultramarine about the tubers of a white dahlia when he planted them, in full confidence that a plant bearing flowers of a resplendent azure would be the necessary result. It is, I presume, useless to record the occurrence of a bitter disappointment to the ingenious amateur. Certain plants are, however, strikingly influenced in the colour of their flowers by the nature of the soil in which they are grown. ”

“ But peculiar disturbing causes occasionally divert the system of transformation from its proper course, and instead of the central portion of the leaf-germs forming themselves into pistil and stamens, and the surrounding leaf-germs into petals and calyx, the whole of the leaf-germs that should have formed various parts of the flower, become petals only, and thus is produced that luxuriant and beautiful monstrosity, that double flower, the ancient glory of gardens, the large double rose. ”

“ A knowledge of the origin of many other domesticated plants now lost, may be eventually recovered by similar methods to those described above. It has been shown of the grain of the cultivated wheat, that like the useful portions of many other plants, it is a monstrosity, but a most useful and important one. To prove that it is really a monstrosity, we have only to consider that the seed is more than ten times its natural bulk, while the husk is reduced to proportions far inferior to those of the typical plant. ”

“ The production of pleasing floral deformity has indeed become so profitable, when judiciously turned to account by experienced dealers, that it is sought for, by every means, with the greatest avidity. By the careful watching of many thousands of seedlings from some plant of which it is wished to procure a double variety, a slight disposition in some one individual to become double may, after the careful watching of perhaps millions of specimens, be at last detected; and if this disposition be only shown by the transformation of a single stamen into a minute and imperfect petal, it is enough. ”

“ The Avena fatua, a troublesome grass-weed, is the parent of our cultivated oat, which has been long well known; as on poor land, and with poor cultivation, the useful monstrosity of its enlarged seed soon degenerates, and the cultivated plant, in a few receding generations, reverts to its original form.
Rye is the cultivated form of Secale cereale. As is well known, it is a very inferior grain to wheat, and no amount of artificial treatment would ever improve it far beyond its present cultivated form. Its sole advantage is its hardiness, as it will grow well where wheat would perish. ”

“ The multiplied petals of the double flower itself are forms of monstrosity which affords a still more direct illustration of the principle that flowers are but developed leaves, as leaves are rudimental flowers, as may be easily shown; and in this case the manner of the transformation is not merely conjectured, as in the preceding case, but can be proved to demonstration. Under ordinary circumstances, and in the greater number of plants, the flowering process occurs when the growth of a branch is stopped by the partial exhaustion of the supply of sap. ”

“ Horticultural skill has found the means of perpetuating such aberrations, either by cuttings from the deformed plant, in which case the malformation always remains of the same degree; or, otherwise, by seed from the aberrating plant, in which last case new varieties of deformity are often obtained. For instance, a certain portion of the seeds, actuated by the peculiar vital principle of the parent plant, will, in most instances, produce plants exhibiting in a greater or lesser degree the same kind of departure from their typical habit of growth, as that exhibited by their immediate parents. ”

“ Not the least singular circumstance connected with deformed flowers is that their fertile and seemingly healthy and perfect seeds, in most instances produce plants subject to a similar aberration to that of the parent, which looks something like a confirmation of the Darwinian theory—the accidentally produced double rose producing, as a rule, double roses. A certain number, however, of the plants produced from these seeds display a tendency to return to the original and perfect form of the single flower, having only a very small number of their stamens converted into petals. ”

“ A second sowing, with seeds gathered from those plants which displayed the most marked tendency to enlargement of the root, would produce a certain number of specimens with still larger roots; and, by pursuing this system of selection through several generations, a race of plants producing, in a favourable soil, roots of truly enormous dimensions would, with certainty, be produced. It was, by such a process, that our well-known esculent, the common carrot, was produced. An experimental botanist, in the south of France, tested the truth of this theory a few years since. ”

“ It is those flowers that have an indefinite number of stamens that display the greatest natural disposition to become double by a number of the superabundant stamens becoming petalets in the process of their transformation from leaf-germs. The rose, therefore, and its allies, having a part of their seed-producing system composed of a great number of stamens, form a family group of flowers which are much more subject to the aberration which diverts a portion of the intended stamens into petalets, than plants which produce flowers with fewer stamens. ”

“ It may be urged with some force that the artificial enlargement of the seed constitutes an improved development, and not a monstrosity; but do we not come to such a conclusion, biassed by the influence of the increased usefulness and value acquired? ”

“ In those classes of plants in which the flowers are only furnished with a small and definite number of stamens, the act of becoming double by the aberrant transformation of the stamens into petals necessarily causes the flower to be altogether barren; useless but beautiful pelatets having taken the place of the whole of the seed-producing system. ”

“ The earliest botanists had not failed to notice the tendency to aberration in plants of almost every class, under certain disturbing influences. They no doubt observed at the same time, that some kinds of plants were much more prone than others to sport into singular monstrosity of growth under such influences. ”

“ The Germans, indeed, appear to have a method of treating the seed of the wallflower and some other plants, either during its growth or afterwards, in some way that gives it a strong tendency to produce double-flowering plants. The double rose, however, produces fertile seed naturally. Only a portion of its numerous stamens having been converted into petals, it still preserves its fertility, the remaining stamens becoming the means of furnishing perfect seeds, though in far more limited numbers than is the case in a single-flowering rose. ”

“ Silver jewellery of Etruscan workmanship is much more rare than gold, and on this account a beautiful silver necklace in the Campana museum is more prized than some of the far richer examples in gold. ”

“ Seeds from the improved plants produced again an improved variety, and after about eight years’ careful culture of each successive generation in direct descent from the original Ægilops, good wheat was produced, presenting all those features which has caused the wheat to be classed as a Triticum, and placed in the same genus as Triticum repens, the common squitch or couch grass, which plant, or one closely allied, some had fancied to be the actual, though remote parent of wheat. ”

“ Among those plants whose monstrosities of leaf-growth have been rendered subservient to the ordinary purposes of life, none exhibit such striking examples as the Brassica oleracea, or common rock-cabbage. ”

“ The seed of that special flower is carefully collected, and if those seeds produce plants, or a single plant, exhibiting a still greater disposition to become double, final success in producing the desired extent of deformity and monstrosity is secure, and the profusely double flower is deemed already in prospective possession of the expectant florist. ”

“ In the Campana collection of ancient Etruscan jewellery, the necklaces alone form a splendid series of eighty-two nearly perfect specimens, besides a number of beautiful fragments.
The art of working in gold was one of the first steps in metallurgy. Gold was more easily worked than any metal known to the ancients; and Homer speaks of stores of it being accumulated in royal treasuries for the purpose of making jewels, &c. In the Bible also are passages, connected with some of the earliest patriarchs, in which jewels of gold are mentioned. ”

“ Several Etruscan bullæ or lockets of this kind, all of them curious, are preserved in the Museum Etruscum Gregorianum.
The Campana collection is particularly rich in necklaces formed of gold and emeralds, above referred to, a rich mixture of colour which appears to have found great favour with the Etrurian world of fashion; but it is the gold work itself that imparts the greatest value and interest to these exquisite remains of ancient art. One necklace, especially, in this collection is distinguished by the most exquisite workmanship of a bearded human head, with the horns of a bull ”

“ In some cases when the tombs were formed on the slope of a hill, the rains of successive centuries at last washed away by slow degrees the earth which covered the roof of the vault, and ultimately the roof itself, thus exposed, crumbled away during some night of unusual storm, and the next morning the shepherds, leading their sheep to browse on those lonely hills, have looked into a dark chasm, and seen with stupid amazement the warriors of 3000 years ago, lying grim and stark in their bronze armour, with the weapons they had used in life placed carefully about them ”

“ It is in these elegant deformities, these beautiful monstrosities, that professional florists find both their profit and delight. The trade in the varieties of double roses has indeed become an important branch of commerce, and the same may be said of the double dahlia and many other exquisitely deformed flowers. ”

“ Its grain, however, in its wild state, is so small, as to appear worthless to those who are acquainted with the grain of cultivated wheat. It is, nevertheless, still gathered in some districts, where ancient custom still prevails, and after being tied up in bunches and dried in the sun, it is set fire to, and the light chaff burns so rapidly, that the grains are quickly freed from it, and only browned by the process, and when thus slightly roasted, it is considered a very agreeable food. ”

“ The first crop, however, raised from wild seeds sown in prepared garden-soil, does not exhibit an enlargement of root which would at once tempt the gardener to proceed with its culture; but the rich orange colour of the root, which at once becomes brighter by culture, may, without reference to size, or increased tenderness of texture, have tempted an inquisitive cultivator to test its flavour. ”

“ Many of our most succulent culinary vegetables, our most delicious fruits, our most valuable edible roots, and our most important varieties of grain, are, in the strictest sense of the term, monstrosities. They are, in each case, deformed aberrations from the natural habit of the respective plants in their original states. ”

“ The Chinese having remained comparatively undisturbed for several thousands of years in the enjoyment of an advanced kind of Oriental civilisation, in which a love of flowers has ever been a distinguishing feature, succeeded in producing several kinds of double-flowering plants many centuries before such double-flowering varieties were known in Europe. ”

“ An interesting illustration of the theory of leaf-transformation often occurs in an unhealthy state of the double-flowered stock. In double varieties of the Brompton, or ten week stock, most amateur gardeners must have observed a peculiar growth that is occasionally developed from some disturbing cause, such as injudicious removal, or unusual degree of cold ”