124 TRANSACTIONS OF THE HORTICULTURAL 



yard, lawn, or garden, but we will take it for granted that you have 

 a place to plant, and I will endeavor to give you a few hints in regard 

 to some of the best perennial plants. 



We will first look in our fields for native or wild plants, remem- 

 bering, when we find one, to give it, as near as possible, a like 

 position in our garden ; and as there are so very many attractive 

 field and forest plants, we can only look at a few of them. 



In the spring we find the wake-robin, claytoma, or spring beauty, 

 dog-tooth, violet, blue-bells and others; although these plants are not 

 so attractive as those which appear later, when we can find cone- 

 flowers, cardinal and blue lobelias, lady slippers, golden rod, asters, 

 daisies, petunias, and a great number of other plants, including ferns, 

 and several vines, which, although wild flowers, are considered in 

 good taste ; in fact, they are the more popular in cities, resorts and 

 at watering places in their seasons. Among the hardy plants which 

 may be obtained of any florist or nurseryman at a small cost, we 

 find many which rival our bedding plants for show. 



The garden phlox (perennis) is a plant which withstands our 

 severest winters and our long summer drouths, and will furnish 

 quantities of bright bloom almost all summer and autumn. They 

 may be had in any shades from white to brightest scarlet, and make a 

 gorgeous show where a number are planted together. The planty- 

 cloden or wahlenbergia, which is a bulbous plant and perfectly 

 hardy, is covered with a profusion of white and sky-blue flowers 

 from June till autumn; it grows about two feet high and will do 

 well in a partially shaded place, but better in hot sunshine. The 

 day-lily, a plant which does well only in a rather dry place, furnishes 

 fragrant|lily-like flowers, which are blue or white, in August. Astille 

 Japanica, or the Japan Spirea, is one of the prettiest summer-bloom- 

 ing plants, with its mist-like white plumes, and flourishes well in 

 almost any sunshiny place. The Japan Animone, which requires a 

 partially shaded place, produces beautiful ivory-white flowers from 

 mid-summer until frost. For a bright, yellow flower, nothing sur- 

 passes the tuberous-rooted sunflower (helianthus multiflora) with 

 its bright flower, and it will do so well in the hot sun and blooms 

 all the season. The deep blue, dwarf plumbago larpentia, fur- 

 nishes a multitude of flowers of this scarcest color in flowers. The 

 carnation-flowered lynchness furnishes us with its double white 

 flowers, nearly all summer, and does best in a partially shaded place. 

 We must not forget pasonias, those old-fashioned flowers which are 

 always showy and which are now being made to flower in the 

 brightest scarlets, nor the hollyhocks for which souie corner should 

 be reserved. 



These plants I have mentioned, all spread, and care should be 

 taken that they do not overgrow other plants. 



Among the hardy imported bulbs which bloom in early spring, 



