THE CHRYSANTHEMUM, AND ITS CULTURE. 



171 



Fig. 27.— 27ie Chrysanthemum. 



heads. The plants are valuable, as out-of- 

 door ornaments in mild autumns, for they 

 succeed the dahlia ; and although a very- 

 severe frost will destroy foliage and flow- 

 ers, they will live through a frost which 

 will cut off the dahlia past recovery. They 

 are, strictly speaking, half-hardy, but their 

 beauty is frequently spoiled just as they 

 are commencing their bloom. The plants, 

 if grown in the ordinary way, are too tall 

 to be handsome, and the lower leaves 

 wither and turn brown before the blooms 

 come to perfection, even when the season 

 is suitable. This can only be counteracted 

 by means of particular culture, and we can 

 only accomplish an improvement in the 

 habit by carefully counteracting the general 

 tendency of the plant to grow lanky and 

 tall. In herbaceous borders, where the 

 subjects are allowed to spread and throw 

 up annually large bundles of stems, and 

 where the general collection of masses 

 bloom year after year in large heads, the 

 appearance of the chrysanthemum is very 

 showy ; and in such places they are undis- 

 turbed three or four years together ; but 

 this can be hardly called cultivation, — a 

 hundred subjects that make very striking 

 flowers under high culture, are but rough, 

 though showy masses of bloom, when al- 

 lowed to take their own choice. The car- 



nation, pink, picotee, auricula, polyanthus, 

 primrose, hyacinth, tulip, narcissus, and 

 many other subjects which are noble under 

 rich and judicious growth, spread and be- 

 come large masses when left a few seasons, 

 and, however pretty in these wilderness- 

 like borders, possess no claims to notice for 

 their individual flowers, nor for the form of 

 their plants: yet, propagated yearly, or 

 separated every season, or dug up and re- 

 planted properly and periodically, they pre- 

 serve a character which is as superior as it 

 is unlike the diminutive blossoms that come 

 in hundreds. The chrysanthemum, then, 

 has to be looked upon in different stations ; 

 first, as a perennial herbaceous plant, in 

 common borders, growing in masses; se- 

 condly, as a dwarf showy plant, sufficiently 

 protected to preserve its foliage in choice 

 clumps or flower borders ; thirdly, as a pot 

 plant, to bloom under cover, and to be re- 

 moved wherever flowers are wanted. 



AS HERBACEOUS PLANTS. 



In all large concerns there are portions of 

 the ground, especially distant from the 

 dwelling, laid out as rough borders, in 

 which herbaceous plants that require no 

 culture are planted, to grow, spread, and 

 bloom, year after year. Hollyhocks, Mi- 

 chaelmas daisies, Aaron's golden rod, pe- 

 rennial lupins, everlasting peas, early prim- 



