Lacock
16 August 1829
My Dear William
The Scilla maritima’s you sent last Christmas are now in fine flower – The cyclamens will not grow with me, and Lindley <1> says he has no better success – when next you send any box of plants, chuse some other mercantile house as your agents, for those people are not civil that the last was consigned to. I cannot raise the interesting Rhinanthus Elephas, <2> nor Linum serrulatum which you discovered in the Apennines, but I have been more fortunate with your Sedum turgidum from the Matese, of which I have some fine plants, they are of a glaucous color. Did you see the flowers, are they white or yellow? It is very odd that many of your seeds turn out quite different from their names, thus “Hypericum crispum” has produced no Hypericum but a beautiful purple Verbena, either V. Lambriti or V. Aublitia – But admitting this to be a mistake of mine or the gardeners, what will you say to “Plantago Brutia” producing two sorts, both excessively common everywhere viz. P. major & media. I am afraid Tenore’s <3> species in general will not bear the test of cultivation <4>. I have another instance. You sent me his Silene fontana. It has just flowered & I recognize the S. quadridentata, an old acquaintance. I have now in flower from your seeds, 2 Salviæ campestris & virgata? Scabiosa crenata (white) Cerastium perfoliatum, a very curious species. And a yellow Carthamus marked “Bagnoli”
Besides these there are growing, but not in flower, the following, all from you, or John <5>.
Henna (Lawsonia inermis)
Cæsalpinia Sappan
Acacia glaucescens
Mimosa Nilotica
Fetneh <6> (Mimosa perhaps Farnesiana)
Sassaban (a beautiful Mimosa)
Sida ambigua, & Sida ricinoides
Psoralea bituminosa, & Ps. tenuifolia
Salvia Garganica, & Salvia Tenorii
Ocymum opulifolium
4 species of Dianthus
10 or 12 kinds of Cistus
Orobus variegatus & Lathyrus alatus
Vicia ochroleuca, & Ervum longifolium
Romulea (Ixia) purpurascens & R. ramiflora
Euphorbia dendroides & E. ceratocarpa, both flourishing –
the Transparent Apple of China
Sideritis brutia
Ononis apula
Centaurea Stæbe
Melilotus Italica
Narcissus neglectus
Arabis collina
Hypecoüm procumbens
The most curious thing in the greenhouse is Cleome pentaphylla Kit <7> gave me the seed, gathered by himself “under the Obelisk of Heliopolis <8>” – The flowers are of a most singular construction with stamina growing on the style, the best instance of a Gynandrous flower I have seen except some of the Passion Flowers –
Yours affly
H.T.
Honble W. Strangways
H.M. Secretary of Legation
Naples
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| 4. | 19. | 4 |
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| [μ?]υδες 3. | 3. | [cyd?] |
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Notes:
1. Prof John Lindley (1799–1865), botanist.
2. See Doc. No: 01704, and Doc. No: 00196.
3. Michel Tenore (1780–1861), Italian botanist & traveller.
4. It was thought in pre-Mendelian days that cultivating a wild plant, that is changing its environment, could cause it to change species. There are numerous references to this in the Correspondence, as though faulty identification at seed-gathering was not fully allowed for.
5. John George Charles Fox Strangways (1803–1859), MP.
6. See Doc. No: 01843.
7. Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot (1803–1890), immensely wealthy landowner, mathematician & politician; WHFT’s Welsh cousin.
8. CRMT was in Egypt in 1827 [see Doc. No: 01616.] The two extant obelisks erected by Tethmosis III at Heliopolis are now in London and New York respectively.