The Amaranths are chiefly natives of America, and very few are supposed to grow naturally in Europe; yet Sir W. Jones speaks of them as if growing wild in Wales:

"Fair Tivy, how sweet are thy waves gently flowing,
Thy wild oaken woods, and green eglantine bowers,
Thy banks with the blush-rose and amaranth glowing
While friendship and mirth claim their labourless hours!"

Among other flowers which derive their origin from unhappy lovers, Spenser mentions the Amaranth. I do not find to whom he means to refer here:

"And all about grew every sort of flower,

To which sad lovers were transformed of yore;
Fresh hyacinthus, Phoebus' paramour,

Foolish Narciss, that likes the watery shore:
Sad Amaranthus, made a flower but late,
Sad Amaranthus, in whose purple gore

Me seems I see Amintas' wretched fate,

To whom sweet poet's verse hath given endless date.”

FAIRY QUEEN, b. iii. c. 6.

Again, near the conclusion of the gnat, he says"Red Amaranthus, luckless paramour."

ERICINE.

ANDROMEDA.

DECANDRIA MONOGYNIA.

Marsh cistus; wild rosemary; poley-mountain; moon-wort; marsh

holy-rose.

THIS plant was named by Linnæus, from the daughter of Cepheus and Cassiope, who was exposed at the waterside, and rescued from the sea-monster by Perseus. Thus a name in botany, especially in the works of this great and illustrious naturalist, is often made to tell two stories-that of its classical prototype and of its own nature.

The Marsh Andromeda, which is a native of America and many parts of Europe, is also a plant of our own;

growing wild in most of our northern counties, as well as in the Lowlands of Scotland. It is an elegant little shrub, with pink flowers, which begin to open toward the end of May.

This is the species of Andromeda the most desirable for home-cultivation; but there are many others, of which two or three are evergreens; as the willow-leaved and the boxleaved Andromedas. They will all bear the open air. In dry summer weather they will require water every evening; if the weather be very hot, they may be watered in the morning also.

ANEMONE.

RANUNCULACEE.

POLYANDRIA POLYGYNIA.

Anemone, from the Greek, anemos, wind: some say because the flower opens only when the wind blows; others, because it grows in situations much exposed to the wind.-French, Anemone, l'herbe au vent [wind herb]; Italian, Anemolo; Fiore Stella.

To do justice to every species of the Anemone, it would be necessary to write a volume upon that subject alone; but it will suffice for the present purpose to speak of the kinds most desirable.

The Anemones are natives of the East, from whence their roots were originally brought; but they have been so much improved by culture, as to take a high rank among the ornaments of our gardens in the spring. As they do not blow the first year, it will be more convenient to purchase the plants from a nursery than to rear them at home: on another account also, it will be better; for they vary so much, that it is impossible to secure the handsomest kinds by the seed; and, when in flower, they may be selected according to the taste of the purchaser. They should be sheltered from frost and heavy rains:

light showers will refresh them, and in dry weather they should be watered every evening, but very gently. When the roots are once obtained, they may be increased by parting.

The Narrow-leaved Garden Anemone grows wild in the Levant. In the islands of the Archipelago the borders of the fields are covered with it in almost every variety of colour; but these are single; culture has made them double.

Of the double varieties of this species there are nearly two hundred. To be a fine one, a double Anemone should have a strong upright stem, about nine inches high; the flower should be from two to three inches in diameter: the outer petals should be firm, horizontal, unless they turn up a little at the end, and the smaller petals within these should lie gracefully one over the other. The plain colours should be brilliant, the variegated clear and distinct.

The Broad-leaved Garden Anemone is found wild with single flowers, in Germany, Italy, and Provence; the single varieties are sometimes called Star-Anemones: they are very numerous, as are also the double varieties, of which the most remarkable are the great double Anemone of Constantinople, or Spanish marygold, the great double Orange-tawney, the double Anemone of Cyprus, and the double Persian Anemone.

There is a species called the Wood-Anemone, which grows in the woods and hedges in most parts of Europe. In March, April, and May, many of our woods are almost covered with these flowers, which expand in clear weather, and look towards the sun; but in the evening, and in wet weather, close and droop their heads. When the WoodAnemone becomes double, it is cultivated by the gardeners; and were the same pains taken with this as with the foreign Anemones, it would probably become valuable.

Anemone roots may be planted towards the end of

September, and again a month later; some plant a third set about Christmas. The first planted will begin to flower early in April, and continue for three or four weeks; the others will follow in succession. As soon as the leaves decay, which of those first planted will be in June, the roots should be taken up, the decayed parts and the earth cleared away; and, having been dried in the shade, they should be put in some secure place, where they may be perfectly dry, and particularly where mice, &c. cannot find access to them. This opportunity may be taken to part the roots for increase; and provided each part has a good eye or bud, it will grow and flower; but they will not flower so strong if parted small. The roots will be weakened, if suffered to remain long in the earth after the leaves decay. They will keep out of the earth for two, or even three years, and grow when planted. The single, or Poppy Anemone, will, in mild seasons, blow throughout the winter.

Earth proper for the Anemone may be procured from a nursery; the roots may be planted in pots five inches wide; the earth an inch and a half deep over the top of the roots, and the eye of the root upwards. They must be kept moderately moist, shaded from the noon-day sun, and exposed to that of the morning. In the winter they should be placed under shelter, but should have plenty of fresh air, when not frosty.

The Abbé la Pluche relates a curious anecdote of M. Bachelier, a Parisian florist, who, having imported some very beautiful species of the Anemone from the East Indies to Paris, kept them to himself in so miserly a manner, that for ten successive years he never would give to any friend or relation whomsoever the least fibre of a double Anemone, or the root of one single one. A counsellor of the parliament, vexed to see one man hoard up for himself a benefit

which nature intended to be common to all, paid him a visit at his country-house, and, in walking round the garden, when he came to a bed of his Anemones, which were at that time in seed, artfully let his robe fall upon them: by which device, he swept off a considerable number of the little grains, which stuck fast to it. His servant, whom he had purposely instructed, dexterously wrapped them up in a moment, without exciting any attention. The counsellor a short time after communicated to his friends the success of his project; and by their participation of his innocent theft, the flower became generally known.

Tournefort, who also relates this story, says that this ingenious flower-stealer took with him three or four of his friends to visit M. Bachelier, and that when they drew near to the place where the Anemones were placed, they began to amuse him, and engage his attention by relating different tales and anecdotes, to prevent his observing what was passing around him.

Rapin, in his poem on gardens, ascribes the birth of the Anemone to the jealousy of Flora; who fearing that the incomparable beauty of a Grecian nymph would win from her the love of her husband Zephyr, transformed her into this flower. But to this tale he adds an account better authorised, of the Anemone having sprung from the blood of Adonis and the tears of Venus shed over his body; and it is but common justice to Flora to observe that this is the generally received opinion of the origin of the Anemone. Cowley gives it this parentage, in his poem on plants. Ovid describes Venus lamenting over the bleeding body of her lover, whose memory and her own grief she resolves to perpetuate by changing his blood to a flower; but less poetically than some others: he substitutes nectar for the tears of Venus; not even hinting that the said nectar was the tears of the goddess.