Botanical Freaks The world is full of freaks, or what
the guardian of a freak exhibited in a London show used to call " progedies." In my garden is a rough bank on which marigolds have sprung up in great numbers and, if the word may be used, of so common, so vulgar a flower, in great splendour. On one plant the first blossom has withered, but from the outside of the circle have sprung up ten flowers, most of them almost perfect and carried on stalks four or five inches in length. It looks as if the seeds had sprouted as wheat grains will sprout in a wet season ; but the origin is different, and is due to the exuberant vitality of the plant : at least, I can get no better explanation from our most scientific florists. The phenomenon is not unconunon and has a good country -name. It is known as the " hen and chickens " variation. This wet season . has produced also more examples than usual of " fasciation," which may be called the ribbon development of over-nourished plants. Both -the . buttercup and the (Penzance) briar have supplied my garden with
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