WCP1375

Letter (WCP1375.1154)

[1]

MUNSTEAD WOOD,

GODALIMNG.

June 24 1908

Dear Mr. Wallace1

Many thanks for the flowers. I put the blue Nymphaea into a pail of tepid water & in two hours it was fully expanded & glorious — the bud opened well too.

Your hybrid Roses are very interesting; the lovely pink No 1 is a perfect gem — often & there is a sweet single pale one rather near it in colour — but lighter. No 2 must also be a pretty garden rose. Your wichuraiana & Jacqueminot is wonderful for strength of colour in the half-opened [2] flower, but the colour is of a quality that (to me) is not pleasant. You often get that kind of magenta in breeding from Jacqueminot, a rose that is tempting to use in either cross as it is both a good pollen & seed bearer —I used to notice it in the hundreds of seedlings at Lord Penzance's2 some years ago —

What is that beautiful heath?

That Pentstemom with the lemon buds in the Sierra Nevada must be a treasure.

Yrs sincerely

G. Jekyll3 [signature]

This letter may have been addressed to William Greenell Wallace instead of ARW. In letter WCP1376, Jekyll referred to ARW as “Dr. Wallace”.
Wilde, James Plaisted (1816 — 1899). First Baron Penzance was a noted British judge and rose breeder who was also a proponent of the Baconian theory that the works usually attributed to William Shakespeare were in fact written by Francis Bacon.
Jekyll, Gertrude (1843-1932). British horticulturist, garden designer, artist and writer.

Please cite as “WCP1375,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP1375