294. Garden 2'opics. 



good ground from ten to fifteen feet, and glorious from September to November. It 

 blooms profusely during the summer, but as the fall advances its color is of the most 

 vivid pink. 



Sotif/iiets hi J'liris- 



Americans cannot appreciate the almost universal custom in Paris and London of 

 button-hole Bouquets. As an evidence of their immense use, a French journal 

 asserts that the average annual sale of bouquets of violets in Paris is 5,825,U00. 

 While in London it is so much the custom that |at entertainments a gentleman 

 appears singular without one. • 



Native Shrubs for Tjittvns. 



Just the hobby we wish some one would ride. Who is there there that can boast 

 special devotion to the study of ornamental and native shrubs for rural decoration ? 

 Whose place is there to be found containing a good collection of best sorts in most 

 perfect growth ? Here is an unoccupied field for our studious horticulturists to 

 branch into. A correspondent of the Tribmie, an ardent admirer of nature's 

 humble beauties, says: 



" There is nothing that adds more to the beauty of a lawn than well-arranged 

 and symmetrical shrubs. Many people buy expensive species, which are not adapted 

 to the soil and climate, and consequently die the same season. Our forests and 

 swamps are filled with beautiful shrubs and creepers, which take kindly to a change 

 of situation, and repay the little care they ask with their beauty and fragrance. 

 One of the most charming places we ever saw was but a few years ago a wild, barren 

 spot, thickly covered in niany places with 'an undergrowth of laurel and sweet fern. 

 The owner has transformed this sterile wild into a sort of miniature paradise. It 

 contains, besides many foreign varieties, nearly every shrub and creeper indigenous 

 to the soil, from the Dogwood, whitening the hills in April, to the Witch Hazel 

 gladdening November with its yellow fringe. The Hemlock answers admirably for 

 hedging purposes, as does also the White Thorn [Cratcegus Coccinea) common in 

 every pasture, and laden in June with corymbs of odorous blossoms. The Pinxter- 

 bloom or Wild Honeysuckle {Azalia ISudtflora) is one of the finest and hardiest 

 shrubs common to our Northern clime, while its delicate pink, or white blossoms, 

 and exquisite fragrance are unexcelled in the vegetable kingdom. For a dry, stony 

 place the American Laurel {Kalrnia latifolia) is a fine evergreen shrub ; for a 

 marshy one nothing is more elegant than the Swamp Laurel [Kalrnia glmtca), with 

 its rich deep green foliage and white flowers. Among our native climbers, the 

 Virginia creeper {Ampelopsis Qidnquefolia) stands first. It is not liable to winter- 

 kill ; its tendrils will cling to most surfaces, and its brilliant scarlet foliage in 

 Autumn is extremely beautiful. The common Clematis (Clematis Virginiana) is 

 well adapted for covering rocks, walls, and unsightly objects. 



I'lantu for Ribbon (iardetiing. 



We need more low-growing shrubby plants of unique and distinct foliage, to be 

 used for ribbon gardening. It is not necessary that they be flowering plants, 

 although everything that bears flowers is welcomed — but something of compact, 

 gpeedy growth — and not over one foot in height. The varieties of Achyranthes are 



