The Jeweller's Window

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30977, 5 February 1966, Page 5

The Jeweller's Window

tural world, is from Greek “pelargos" a stork. Numbers of flowers are thus named from parts of birds and beasts, “catsear." “coltsfoot," "bear’s breech,” "mouse-ear,” myosotis, etc.

In spite of its great popularity as a garden plant the geranium is not a professional beauty like the rose and the lily and rarely, if ever, appears in any poetic context. Neither has it inspired proverbs or popular sayings. There are nine wild species in Britain and five in the flora of New Zealand, but one of these occurs only in the Chatham Islands. There are three British species naturalised in New Zealand of which my own favourite is the charming little Herb Robert, Geranium robertian.

This carries a very pleasant characteristic perfume; it prefers the wetter areas of our country and I have rarely or never seen it in Canterbury. There are at least ninety species of geranium in Australia one of them being our Chatham Islands plant, Geranium Traversii.

All our other species are inconspicuous and none of them has any interest for the gardener. It would be impossible now, I think, to tell which of the numerous kinds was the original garden plant.

The oldest to be cultivated, according to the record, was a purple Italian species now called “macrorhyzum” (longrooted) which dates from 1576 and the next was the striped “G. striatum,” also from Italy, 1629. The only appearance of the geranium in slang or colloquial English is the rude schoolboy’s use of geranium for the head a kind of pun on cranium.