For October, 1923 



257 



Self-Sown Biennials 



To every amateur whd ueirks with his own ten 

 digits and not by tlie prcjxy cif a professional 

 gardener there comes a time, I fancy, soon or 

 late, when his spontaneous energy is less than it once 

 was, and the passion for muscular toil sensibly abates ; 

 when, in short, he is disposed, in respect of garden 

 work, to accept the advice to "moderate his trans- 

 ports." It is then one learns to regard with a pref- 

 erence — half gratitude, half afifection — those easy 

 plants which give little trouble — bulbs which come up 

 year after year without abating a jot of their beauty, 

 herbaceous plants which require neither annual ma- 

 nuring nor periodic transplanting, shruljs that want 

 nothing for their well-being but abundance of space, 

 and things, annual or biennial, that see to their own 

 propagation and require on your part nothing more 

 arduous than judicious thinning with the hoe. About 

 these last a word may be permitted by way of sug- 

 gesting to brother gardeners, whose vertebral column 

 is possibly not the elastic thing it once was, one or 

 two plants of this easy class which will well repay 

 the little trouble of growing them ; not so much 

 about annuals, however, as about some half-dozen 

 biennials which are worth while and which require 

 only a first foothold to become permanent denizens 

 of the garden. Though, if it comes to that, there is 

 no lack of desirable annuals with this same valual:)le 

 quality of permanency ; for, however tender and beau- 

 tiful an annual may be, there is somewhere a country 

 where it sows itself one year to come up the next, 

 where, in other words, it is a weed. Nigella, Cen- 

 taurea, Iberis, Nemophila, Clarkia, Alyssum are weeds 

 in the coimtry of their nativity and may become 

 weeds in any garden where slugs permit. A biennial, 

 however, is another thing, being, as a rule, of larger 

 stature and more stately habit, and requiring, in con- 

 sequence, two years to build up its system and com- 

 pete the cycle of its growth. One of large size and impos- 

 ing appearance, is the tall Evening Primrose (Qino- 

 thera biennis). This beautiful and interesting flower 

 has been a standing feature in my garden for ten 

 years and more. It comes up here and there in the 

 borders in unexpected places — often, of course, where 

 it is not wanted, but often also, I must do it justice 

 to say, precisely where I should have wished it to he 

 if I had thought the matter out. In any case, if it 

 should come where you do not wish it to be, a touch 

 of the hoe is sufficient. On the other hand, should 

 you wish to have it in any spot where it has not 

 chosen to come, few things are so easy to transplant. 

 The endurance of the plant is wonderful. Drv 

 weather or moist, your transplanted CEnothera, after 

 wilting for a day or two, will brace up and look as 

 lively as if it had sown itself wdiere you had placed it. 

 The beauty of the Evening Primrose is sufficient to 

 recommend it if it had nothing else, but, for me, one 

 of its attractions is its evident delight in life and 

 growth. I had rather see, for my part, a Dock or a 

 Thistle grow as if it enjoyed life, than the most pre- 

 cious stove or alpine treasure that lingers out a 

 coddled existence ; though, for all that. I do not denv 

 the satisfaction there is in coaxing a sick plant back 

 to vigorous life. Every hospital nurse knows this 

 kind of triumph. But there is no room for coaxing or 

 coddling with Qinothera biennis. Wet does not harm 

 it, neither does drought ; it seems to prefer exactly 

 the conditions of soil and weather it happens to get. 

 It is subject to no parasites, blights or diseases that 



1 have ever seen. It stands erect without support; 

 or if the \\-ind does happen to twist ofi:" a branch or 

 two, these are not missed — there are so many left. 

 P)Ut, after all, the distinction of this, as of all Evening 

 Primroses, is that it is a flower of the dusk, one of 

 the far from numerous vespertine group which wake 

 to full activity only when Marigolds, Daisies and 

 other drowsy composites are folding their petals to 

 rest. Night moths, which are so drawn to light in 

 darkness, must certainly frequent the flower, though 

 I do not know which they are. When the evenings 

 begin sensibly to lengthen, and the air has an eager 

 tang, which, though pleasant, is a premonition of 

 something more nijiping and less pleasant yet to 

 come, my own otherwise modest garden becomes for 

 a time almost flamboyant, lit up as it is from end to 

 end with Chinese lanterns — that is to say, with 

 lingering blooms of many-colored single Hollyhocks 

 swinging on their wands to the wind, but chiefly with 

 the vesper lamps of CEnothera Ijiennis, which flop 

 open one by one while the light is waning, as if fairy 

 Mrs. Gamps were unfurling their umbrellas. Those 

 who grow these CEnotheras must have observed how 

 punctiliously they observe their times and seasons — 

 how. in opening their first blooms, the various plants 

 synchronize (there is no other word) as regards not 

 merely the hour, but the day and the month, possibly 

 even the minute. Scattered plants, separated pos- 

 sibly bv considerable distances in a large garden, will 

 burst into bloom with a wonderful unanimity, at the 

 same hour of the same day of the three hundred and 

 sixty-five. Finally, to complete its tale of virtues, 

 this flower has a pleasant fragrance — not obtrusive, 

 but faint and elusive rather, as befits the creptiscular 

 liour, yet sufficient sometimes to cloy the air a little, 

 for the perfume is of the rich exotic kind which we 

 associate with such things as Orange Blossom, Jas- 

 mine and Stephanotis. 



Another fine biennial which may be trusted to hold 

 its own when once introduced, is the Giant Sea 

 Holly (Eryngium giganteum). I suppose we must 

 regard all the Sea Hollies as umbellifers. But to eyes 

 like mine, which look to the appearances of things 

 rather than to their hidden affinities, this Eryngium 

 has the Thistle attributes raised to a high power, ex- 

 cept stature, perhaps, for I do not suppose that the 

 height even of luxuriant specimens is much over 3 

 feet. But the completeness of its holly-like apparatus 

 for self-defence, its mathematical grace and sj'm- 

 metry of shape, and the veined silver of its leaves 

 seem to assign it a place among those things which 

 "none may molest with impunity." One must not, 

 however, in this biennial, look for the steel-blue which 

 is the conspicuous beauty of stem and flower in so 

 many Eryngiums. Silver is its metal, not steel, simu- 

 lation of frosty silver being its outstanding feature, 

 the most successful mimicry of the metal known to 

 me among many silvery plants. I have spoken, er- 

 roneouslv perhaps, of this flower as a biennial, since 

 it might possibly be. more correctly described as a 

 triennial. Grown under exceptionally favorable con- 

 ditions, the Giant Eryngium may flower the second 

 year from germination, but I do not think many of 

 mine, if any, do so. In this, the third year of one 

 batch, there has been a great display of flowering 

 heads — leaving many, however, for next year, which, 

 when they come, will, properly speaking, I s"pnose, 

 be quadrennials. — The Garden. 



