Nature being ever obedient to laws, certain knowledge of her ways is the more easy to acquire—the law of species will be the same in a thousand years as it is to-day. Culture has certainly improved species, and finished what Nature could not by herself complete. Some accidents have become thus a second nature, remaining permanent if another accident does not again occur to disturb the existing order.
Chapter IV.—Seeds
Although there is a way of propagating hyacinths by seed, like other plants, yet it should be known to all that it is seldom that a double hyacinth produces seed, and such a thing has not been known as a seed (from either double or single hyacinth) ever producing a species at all resembling the hyacinth from which the seed is taken. “La Perruque quarrée,” a red hyacinth, has produced “La Comète”—a very fine sort, and a splendid red, but it has no resemblance to “La Perruque quarrée,” and yet they are about the nearest in likeness that have been produced. There is no visible difference between the seeds of double and single hyacinths. Gardeners are more hopeful of raising double flowers from the seeds of single hyacinths than of raising double from the seeds of double. They have not yet found any principle to go upon in the choice of seeds, however many experiments have been made. Some have thought a well-formed hyacinth in its seventh year, being then in its prime, is more likely to produce double flowers from its seed than it would be if ten or fifteen years older. It is supposed that the seed of a full hyacinth, which has its petals redoubled to the centre of the flower, possesses an advantage over others, or double may be raised from its seed, but it very rarely produces seed at all; when it does, success is still very uncertain. Some like to try semi-double; some follow one method, some another, few obtain the same result twice over. Some amateurs, once upon a time, longing to obtain a new sort of flower, sowed the seeds of a single yellow hyacinth, very pale in colour, and of quite a small and common sort; they were lucky enough to obtain splendid flowers of a very good white, the centre a perfect yellow, stems and blossoms all superb,—“Saturne,” “Heroine,” “Flavo Superbe.” “Og Roi de Basan” also derives its origin from the stock raised from this seed.
Countless experiments have been made, and all tend to show that flowers produced from seed never resemble the flower from which the seed was taken. As a rule they differ in every point, shape, colour, and height. Nature insists so much on variety that even seeds taken from the same seed-vessel do not produce flowers alike. Some may be red, others blue or white, large or small, as the case may be, sometimes they are fortunate enough to get several double varieties from the seed of the single hyacinth. It must be confessed, added to other difficulties there is this: it is four years before the seed produces its flower—that is, in an ordinary way, for sometimes it is more advanced by one or two years. As during the course of four years the bulbs are taken up three times out of the ground, it may sometimes happen that the experiment has failed through negligence, but there has never been any doubt at all about the fact of a seed never producing the same kind of hyacinth as the parent stock.
One should not cut the hyacinth stalk, or separate it from the bulb, if seeds are to be taken from it, until the ovaries are yellow and beginning to open and show their seeds, which should be already black. Then they can be cut and put in a place where they are protected from sun and rain, and when the ovaries are quite dry the seed can be taken from them and very carefully kept (not wrapped up or covered) until the time for sowing them, about the middle of October. Growers who have no interest in preserving the seed believe it is a bad thing to exhaust their bulbs by leaving the seed to ripen on the plant. The earth that the seeds are thrown upon should be well prepared (I shall describe its composition presently).
The seed is visible enough to be spread about without the necessity of mixing it with sand, as is sometimes done with vegetable garden seeds. They must not be sown too thick, and about an inch deep. When it is beginning to turn cold they must be protected from the frost by a covering of manure, leaves, or tan. The seed, which begins soon to germinate, is very sensitive to heat and cold. The parts of the seed are not unlike a fruit. It is first covered by a strong black skin, and under this a fleshy substance. This contains an almond, within which is enclosed the germ; this develops in the same manner as in the seeds of all plants that are called by botanists “one lobed” or “monocotyledon.” During growth this almond part of the seed detaches itself from its wraps.
When the grain is put into the ground in the month of October it swells, and the germ, piercing through the pericarp or fleshy part of the seed, begins to develop itself. The little leafy shoot which pushes upward is the part that botanists call the plumule, and the part which pushes from the central axis (or plantule) is called the radicle or little root. During the first year the little root is always tuberous or knotted. It does not yet draw sap from the earth. It is generally agreed among botanists that the plumule and radicle (the plant and little root) at this stage draw their nourishment from the cotyledon or seed-lobe, to which they are still joined. This lobe goes on nourishing the plant till the bulb has already taken form, and takes in nourishment from the earth (through its base).
The thin round leaf-shoot which comes up remains bent a whole year before it has gained sufficient strength to rise straight. The first year the root is only a thin thread; sometimes it grows very long and is full of knots, then it is organically diseased, and the bulb will be very weak and worthless. They often die when the root is thus deformed. To make a well-formed bulb the root should have only one knot at the place where it comes from the seed; upon this the bulb forms itself. At first it is composed of a single tunic, and this tunic is joined and completely closed on all sides.
At the end of one year (after sowing the seed), if the bulb were taken up, one would find this tunic lined with two other tunics exactly like it.
The bulbs being still very small, they exhaust the soil very little, so that the first year growers do not take the trouble to take them up. But an amateur, who raised a great many from seed, used to say he thought taking them up every year certainly assisted their growth.