106 THE FLORAL WOELD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



making tlie uninitiated hunt about in vain " for the flower that smells 

 so sweet." It was Datura ceratocaulon, a native of South America, 

 but which it is a comfort to know may be had as cheap as the com- 

 monest annual in cultivation, at threepence per packet. The flowers 

 are intensely beautiful, and of a satiny texture. Well worth growing 

 is the plant for these alone ; but as it opens best in the evening with 

 the evening primroses, it is, perhaps, without exception, the noblest 

 sweet-scented annual in cultivation. 



Whatever other merits this essay may possess, I think it will be 

 granted that in point of time of appearance it is apropos. This is 

 " seed-time," and the harvest of your flower, or " cottage," or any 

 kind of garden yet named, will be rendered very much more pleasant 

 by ordering a packet or two of this annual, when this paper meets 

 your eye. Sow a few grains in a pot, and some in the open air, 

 about the end of April ; and however it is sown, plant it in a border 

 among yovir favourite flowers, or put it with the sweet-scented 

 things we are speaking of, or put it anywhere that a flower will 

 grow, and I promise you that you will be delighted with it, parti- 

 cularly when the day is about to retire from the svunmer world, and 

 you go out in the cool evening of a hot day to imbibe a little of the 

 beautiful breath of earth, when life and growth is busiest and sweetest. 

 This paper, I have said, will meet the eye of the Floeal World 

 public just at the right moment, when everything is " coming out " 

 — the snails and humans out of their homes into the garden; the 

 purses out of our pockets for seed-buying ; the buds are thrusting 

 " out their little hands into the ray." This is the very moment 

 for the sowing of fragrant flowers, if not already performed — the 

 annuals, of course, 1 chiefly now refer to. There are othei" daturas 

 named in the seed catalogue, but I confess never to have seen them 

 do much or any good, and some I have not seen at all. Some are 

 described as very fragrant, but I fear they are too tender for our 

 gardens. 



Perhaps the not always odoriferous order Cruciferse furnishes 

 more sweet flowers for our gardens than any other — the sweet- 

 scented rocket (H. tristis), and the night-scented stock (M. tristis), 

 the sweet alyssum, sweet candytuft, the fragrant honesty, and a 

 host of delightfully-scented stocks and wallflowers belonging to it. 

 And this year a new addition to its perfumed ranks is being made by 

 the introduction of Matthiola bicornis, not yet seen much in England, 

 but described as emitting a powerful fragrance, and resembling a 

 mixture of stock and sweet-scented clematis combined. It is half 

 closed and weak-scented during the day, but opens towards evening, 

 like many of its kind, and then the scent is suflicient to arrest 

 attention at one hundred yards distance. It is not an attractive 

 plant from any other point of view. Treat it as a hardy annual. 



Artemisia annua is recommended for its perfume, which is some- 

 what in the way of the woruiwood and southernwood ; but its chief 

 merit is that it furnishes a nice tapering bush of pleasant green, and 

 of an elegant character — a fine thing for the mixed border, if only 

 for variety's sake. 



In addition to sweet peas in plenty, it would be well to bear in 



