THE 



GARDENER 



JULY 1870. 



A PLEA FOR HARDY HERBACEOUS PLANTS. 



F there is one aspect of gardening more than another that 

 stands ont prominently in the present day, it is this — that 

 many of the fine old hardy perennials and biennials, with 

 others not quite hardy, yet not difficult of management, 

 are slowly but surely rising in popular favour, and that they will ere 

 long be eagerly sought for the decoration of the flower-garden. It is 

 equally certain that the rage for "bedding out," in so far as it is pictured 

 in glowing masses of scarlet and crimson, rose and blue, yellow and 

 white, or in long ribbon-lines composed of these and other shades of 

 colour, differently arranged, with little to relieve the glare or tone 

 down the most pronounced hues, is gradually expending itself, for the 

 very monotony of its annual recurrence presages its decay. The par- 

 tial employment of these gaudy-coloured flowers can become, by means 

 of judicious grouping, a great aid in the decoration of the flower- 

 garden ; it is when they hold absolute sway, when nothing else but 

 these glaring masses of colour is employed, that they become offensive 

 and cease to be satisfying. 



The large classes of hardy perennials and biennials supply numerous 

 plants yielding beautiful, and in many instances highly fragrant, 

 flowers of divers types ; combined with many forms of leaf foliage that, 

 when "uncrowned by flowers" even, are by no means unattractive of 

 themselves. But in the past few years, during the arbitrary reign of 

 a somewhat diseased perception of beauty in the garden that failed to 

 see much that is attractive in our fine old and many new herbaceous 

 plants, they were ruthlessly thrust aside, as bereft of charms, and as 

 fitted only for some out-of-the-way place remote from the flower-garden. 



T 



