The Amer ica n Botanist 



VOL. XXX. OCTOBER. 1924. No. 4 



When fades the cardinal flower, whose red heart bloom 



Glows like a living coal upon the green 

 0/ the midsummer meadows, then how bright. 



How deepening bright, lil^e mounting flame doth burn, 

 The golden-rod upon a thousand hills! 



Richard IVatson Gilder. 



PERENNIAL FOUR O'CLOCKS 



By Willard N. Clute 



TN their native haunts, the common garden four-o'clocks 

 -*■ are perennial but when grown in more northern latitudes 

 they commonly die under the rigors of winter. A great 

 many people probably do not know that this plant may be 

 made perennial in cool regions by tligging up the roots in 

 autumn and treating them like dahlias. 



The illustration on the opposite page shows a single 

 perennial plant of this kind. It is now ten years old and 

 exhibits no sign of senility ; in fact, it seems to grow strong- 

 er with age. This season it will jjroduce approximately ten 

 thousand blossoms. 



The plant has had a varied existence. One year it was 

 overl(X)ked entirely and did not get back into the soil for 

 eighteen months, so that while the plant is ten years old it 

 has seen only nine summers. This is the specimen mention- 

 ed in this magazine some time ago which illustrates am- 

 phichromy. producing both white and red flowers on the 



