140 THE FLOEAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



thing in British gardens, is a good rockwork, and when one is met 

 with that is satisfactory from an artistic point of view, it is usually 

 covered with rank vegetation sufficient to destroy all the chances the 

 real alpines might have if planted. Probably the noblest rockworks 

 iu England are those at Chatswoi-th, where the noble wood-crowned 

 hm behind the " Palace of the peak " suits the formation of such, 

 and there they certainly have been made on a grand scale and by a 

 tasteful hand. Perns and herbaceous plants, etc., predominate, but 

 the dwarf and genuine alpine plant is not favoured : indeed the 

 great shoals and clefts do not suit things which like the full sun and 

 free air, however much they may relish abundant water at the 

 root 



The lest rockwork in England is at Tork, in the nurseries of the 

 Messrs. Backhouse. On it and about it at this day of the year may 

 be seen a display of vegetable beauty and interest probably not to be 

 had on any spot in the open air in the world ! It is also the most 

 real of rockworks, inasmuch as it is devoted chiefly to growing high 

 alpine plants, and growing them successfully too. On it may be 

 seen the rare and dwarf alpine Bianthus with grass-green leaves, 

 clinging close to the earth as the moss does to the tree, and sending 

 up in the early summer rich rosy flowers, round enough and stiff 

 enough to please the most fastidious florist, on stems two inches 

 high, in company with those lovely pale rose and rich purple and pure 

 white primulas (P. marginata, ciliata, and nivalis respectively), not 

 to mention numerous other species which are truly the glory of the 

 high hills, as far above in beauty and brilliancy of flower, the 

 natives of the valleys of temperate climes or even of torrid, as 

 their home is above high water mark. This is no exaggeration, 

 reader ! When tiny primulas and gentians, that might be potted 

 in a lady's thimble, produce trusses or even single flowers of trans- 

 cendental vividness of colour, you may imagine what they are 

 capable of when in their native home in the pure light and air of high 

 European mountains. The gorgeous and fascinating entanglement 

 of beauty of form and richness of colouring displayed in a Brazilian 

 and Ceylonese forest, we have all heard of, and Humboldt and 

 Darwin, and others, have taken some pains to record it for us, but 

 even their impressions of delight and rapture fall short of those of 

 botanists who liave investigated the alpine flora. I cannot suppose 

 that many readers have been fortunate enough to see such gentians 

 as bavarica and verna in good condition, but it may be safely said 

 that till those flowers are seen it is impossible to form an idea of the 

 depth and vividness of their colouring. Mr. Atkins, of cyclamen 

 renown, a gentleman with a great love and capital knowledge of 

 alpine vegetation, has told me of having frequently spanned with 

 his hand fifty flowers of one of these gentians fully opened at once 

 on a plant not more than an inch high. Well, this great York rock- 

 work grows hundreds of the choicest alpines in the world ; but it 

 has been the result of an expenditure which no other nurseryman 

 would risk, and of a knowledge of the natural habits of alpine 

 vegetation on the part of one of the firm, which few other botanists 

 possess. Nearly 500 tons of millstone grit were employed in it8 



