THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDElIf GUIDE. 147 



great bed of rhododendrons surrounded with roses, and the whole 

 enclosed in a broad ring of ivy, looking quite grand in a garden. 



Another good use for the ivy is to clothe banks that are shaded. 

 Here we may have great sheets of such a kind as the variegated 

 Hedera canariensis, and the poorer the soil for it the better the 

 colour of the variegation. So again, many barren places under trees 

 in gardens could be made beautiful by clothing them with ivy ; the 

 merest scraps inserted any time during summer would take root and 

 in due time spread into rich masses of dark green vegetation. 



But the most interesting of all the uses of the ivies is to furnish 

 the garden in winter. For this purpose they are grown in pots, and 

 are placed where required when the proper time comes. One of our 

 best friends has brought this system of using them to perfection, 

 and it is impossible to see the plants and not feel that a quite new 

 epoch in horticulture is inaugurated therein. 



All the small-leaved ivies are well adapted for growing in close 

 glass cases. They bear the confinement admirably, and are most 

 easy to train if the mechanical means of training are provided, such 

 as wires, etc. I do not hesitate to say that the common Hedera helix 

 (that is, the wild ivy of the English woods) is one of the most elegant 

 plants ever seen when grown in closed cases, and is well adapted to 

 increase the interest of a collection of ferns. In some town localities 

 double windows are formed to exclude dust and subdue the summer 

 heat. Sometimes ferns are planted in those windows, and they 

 perish. A¥ell, if such be the case, the owner need only plant com- 

 mon wild ivy, and very soon the window will become a rich green 

 screen, the delight ofall who behold it. 



It is well known that ivy is one of the best of plants for walls, but 

 it is not every ivy-clad wall that is a credit to its owner. Certainly, 

 to keep a wall well covered is worthy of the little care and expense 

 required. The climbing varieties of variegated ivies make superb 

 coverings for walls, especially the very distinct and constant Hedera 

 canariensis maculata. Amateurs would find much amusement in col- 

 lecting the variegated and other ivies, and planting them to climb up 

 walls, and rock-work, and about trellises, arbours, and stumps of 

 trees. 



IMPATIENS JEEDONI-^. 



[•HIS splendid plant is usually described as an annual, 

 but it is a perennial, and may be grown for any number 

 of years. I will give you an account of one that was 

 in my care. The plant was bought at a sale in the 

 autumn of 1860, and was then two years old, and 

 nearly a foot in diameter ; its lower branches rested on the soil, 

 and were rooted in the same manner as layers ; it was kept dry all 

 winter, only watered when it show^ed signs of shrinking from being 

 kept dry ; as soon as it began to grow in spring, 1801, it was top- 

 dressed with leaf-mould, and placed gradually at the warmest end of 



