TALBOT1661

Florence
March 25

Dear Henry

Cyclamen seed (autumnal) is just ripe & I shall set about collecting some. They have at last got the spring one in the Giar. Semplice & I am able to compare the two – besides the difference between the flowers which are here the leaves are more diff^t than I thought – the spring one is more truly & constantly ivy leaved than the other, (which is always running into heartshaped, arrow or halberd shaped &^c) & has jagged edges – & they come up before the flowers – not so the autumnal – I mean to make my own systema vegetabilium ¹ & erect 5 only species of Cycl. C. vernum. æstivum. autumnale. Persicum & Coum – & I defy anyone to mistake them I do the same with Tulips which Raddi ² Reboul ³ & I are recasting, & mean to make also 5 species of this neighborhood on. T. O. Solis ⁴. Sylvestris. Gesneriana Clusiana & suaveolens – the first & last comprising 4 or 5 varieties each. I recommend you to do the same – for they are turning botany upsidedown with new names. Have you Gays ⁵ tract on Crocus think of his giving minimus to one of the largest & shewyest species that of Castellamare – they say C maesiacus is found in the Sabine hills.

I made a great & grand discovery at Rome, a little to the confusion of Mauri ⁶ who had lived there all his life without finding it out – Going one day to see Roma Vecchia about half way to Cecilia Metella just opposite or a little before coming to a dilapidated castellated villa which looks like a Castle for Don Quixote – I saw an immense mass of ruin more like a rock than a tomb, quite covered with hedera chrysocarpa whose golden berries hung pendant in the sun. There was but one plant & that a very old one & must have been seen by everyone who went to visit Cecilia Metella since the days of Pliny. I think you ought to have found it out too. Bertoloni ⁷ who knew of it from you or me has held it out as a desideratum for young Italian botanists to look for but calls it Hedera poetarum as if it was half a fiction. As far as I could see, none of the leaves were hederiform, all heartshaped, slightly undulated.

On Tuesday I am going with Raddi à la recherche d Ornith. exscapum ⁸ at Caraggi I have already found again the tulip of the Villa Baring of which I once found 2 on a stalk. I did not go to Albano – but S. bifolia & anemone Apennina are to be had cheap in England & by patience & a good gardener are easily encreased. Most gardeners cut flowers & save no seed which is a great cause of the poverty of gardens. Anem. hortensis is poor here – at Rome very fine. I found a quantity of apennina all white at Montesori & much I. bulbocodium & crocus biflorus pusillus albus. What think you of a new Cherleria on the summit of Etna! & the Pæstum rose turning out the Rosa Borreri an English rose! I found Parietaria lusita ⁹ at Rome – Romulea purpurea & intermedia – N. pseudonarcissus – pale petals shorter than the cup. Have you heard of Camellias & Cape heaths at Abbotsbury ¹⁰ in flower in the open air in Feb^y? I rec^d also an A. pavonina from thence the other day – single-flowered.

I am afraid I can hardly send a bushel of cyclamen seed but I suppose a mixture will do of roots, &c – Try all sorts of tender plants against the quantity of walls you have such as myrtle, oleander, Cratægus glabra, Glycine Dolichos – Bignonia capreolata – Pandora – Rosa banksiæ Melaleuca lanceolata &c Acacia Iulibrissin – what kind of Gardener has Mackay sent you I wish it had been May when I passed the woods of Narni there is such a nice wall under the Hermitage where I am sure there are orchideæ in abundance. I came by Todi to Perugia thro a rich & riant ¹¹ country – more than can be said for most part of the kingdom of Rome. Todi is a curious old place a little like Volterra – with a fine old lombard cathedral – the road odiously hilly because you see it need not be so – you pass a fine old roman bridge of 5 arches – the country beautifully wooded & near the Tiber great part of the way I saw Perugia Cortona & Aresso. ¹² the new road will be open next winter by the Val di Chiana Chiusi & Orvieto – to Rome. My picture gallery encreases – where on earth I shall put them all I don’t know. I think a few antiques would suit Lacock very well don’t you think Cimabue or Giotto might really have painted in the gallery? I advise the English artists to introduce fresco painting into England – may hold out the hope of employment on the lunette of your cloisters? I am more & more enraged at the supineness of the Gov^t in not buying pictures, pray try to inspire L^d Dudley ¹³ with some taste. I saw at Rome the dealer who bought that magnificent Capponi Perugino that was offered to us – he tells me it is safe in the Berlin Gallery. Last week the Tempi Raphael was bought by or for the King of Bavaria (who employs a cunning old German to be always on the look out) it goes to Munich in a few days. There is now a lovely picture of M. Albertinelli to be sold framed & cleaned for 50 louis – after the Salutation in the Gallery the finest I ever saw. I would rather have it than all C. Dolcis ¹⁴. The dealers that collect for Germany buy old & modern perfect & imperfect, sketches &c from 1000 Luigi to 20 scudi – so as to make a school – which is what we shall never have & do not deserve to have. I should like to have 5000£ to lay out in pictures then when I had made a complete historical collection the Gov^t would perhaps condescend to buy it, if the times were not economical.

Have you Pteris Cretica alive? My genoese plants are coming on slow – Ornithogalum angustifolium will flower but I fear Scilla undulatum & Iris juncea will not – I know nothing of Kit ¹⁵ – Pray come over the Alps at least as far as [illegible] the grassy slopes of the Bernardino & Val [illegible] will certainly afford you some sport. I dare say as much as [illegible] ¹⁶

I want somebody to find the Cactus said to grow in Switzerland also the Colchicum montanum more likely alpinum – You will of course lade ¹⁷ yourself with a stock of Alpine plants Cyclamen europæum, Rhodod. chamæcistus – Gentiana utriculosa Polygula chamæbuxus purpurea & other guinea plants at Chelsea

[address panel:]
Henry F. Talbot Esq^r
31. Sackville Street ¹⁸