68 



GARDENING. 



Nov. i$, 



is put over all shrubbery beds, tree boles 

 and the lawn. 



The labels of the hybrid perpetual roses 

 are taken up and tied to the plants, which 

 are then bent over and fastened to some 

 neighbor. The side of the bed is boxed 

 in. the bed filled with dry leaves and then 

 roofed with boards. Allowance for cir- 

 culation of air above the leaves is pro- 

 vided. In the cutting grounds these roses 

 are planted in rows, there they are bent 

 over and covered with soil, in the same 

 manner I cover my raspberries. Before 

 doing so, each plant has a small tag of 

 sheet lead with a number stamped on 

 fastened to it by wire. These numbers 

 are pencilled on the back of its summer 

 labels which are put away and a mem- 

 orandum also kept. Azalea, mollis, rho- 

 dodendrons, crape myrtle, and similar 

 plants are wintered in boxes in the cellar. 



The cannas are taken up with all the 

 soil that will adhere to them and placed 

 in anv cellar that will keep potatoes 

 safelv^ In their place I put tulips and 

 hyacinths, which are through blooming 

 before wanted for cannas. Beds contain- 

 ing narcissus, English and Spanish irises, 

 or anv early riser, are covered with half 

 rotted oak leaves (saved from last win- 

 ter's covering) which allows them to 

 come up through it without bleaching. 

 In the meantime the cold frames have 

 been filled with foxgloves, Canterbury 

 bells, and the Chimney campanulas, tri- 

 tomas, montbretias, pansies, Hypericum 

 moserianium. Seedling Iceland poppies, 

 and any young perennials (unless unques- 

 tionably hardy), rooted cuttings of dian- 

 thus, snapdragons, pentstemons, carna- 

 tions, etc. Then comes a deeper cold 

 frame filled with the tender roses. Anem- 

 one coronaria and tender iris have their 

 cold frames and one sash is filled with 

 dry leaves, the glass and shelter put on 

 and not opened until some fine day in 

 February when it is planted with Ranun- 

 culus. 



All unoccupied beds in the kitchen gar- 

 den or elsewhere are ridged up to get the 

 benefit of the winter's frost. 



Nordman's silver fir, which is not happy 

 here, newly planted or exposed ever- 

 greens not over hardy have solid board 

 wind breaks placed around them Liquid- 

 ambar stryaciflua loses its terminal buds 

 here but I am getting a young specimen 

 in good form by fastening small bunches 

 of excelsior to the tips. Nursery trees 

 and shrubs for next spring's planting 

 have their roots pruned when received so 

 as to become calloused before spring, and 

 carefully heeled in in a slanting position 

 in the most sheltered and best drained 

 place at my command, and covered with 

 straw or rough litter. W. C. Egan. 



Highland Park, near Chicago. 



THE WILD GARDEN. 

 It is gratifying to see the increasing in- 

 terest shown by your readers and coi re- 

 spondents in the fascinating subject of 

 Wild Gardening. This growing interest 

 is, no doubt, largely due to the editorial 

 encouragement supplied by the columns 

 of your excellent paper. It is plain, also, 

 that the same taste has taken root and 

 is showing growth among the people at 

 large. The amateurs and small cultiva- 

 tors. Owners of small holdings, lovers 

 of little back-yard gardens, and all who 

 are content with simple experiments in 

 flower raising, are beginning to appreci- 

 ate the treasures of the -woods, and the 

 pleasure of introducing a few rustic beau- 

 ties to the company of their cultivated 

 pets in the flower border, where both may 

 flourish and shine together. Such a happy 

 and easy combination of nature and art 



is worth the while of every garden lover. 

 Wm. Robinson's "Wild Garden," which 

 I read twenty years ago with much inter- 

 est gave almost the fi st impulse to this 

 style of gardening in England, and also 

 to some extent in this country, and I am 

 glad to see by a recent note in Gardening 

 that a new edition, enlarged and beauti- 

 fied, has been lately issued in London, 

 and a copy very properly sent to your 

 worthy self. 



But Mr. Robinson's idea is not a new 

 one. Long before his book gave form 

 and emphasis to the plan of combining 

 the garden plants with the wildings, 

 there were few garden lovers of my ac- 

 quaintance, who, fifty years ago prac- 

 ticed this pleasant habit, and who de- 

 lighted to enrich their small flower beds 

 with accessions from the wildwoods and 

 meadows. 



The intimacy thus established between 

 the two classes, the rustic and therefined, 

 proved an advantage to both. The rus- 

 tics quickly felt the stimulus of improved 

 soil and better care. They hastened to 

 put on their better attire and often out- 

 stripped and outshone their more aristo- 

 cratic neighbors. 



At first, naturally, the contrast was 

 broad, the old residents claimed prece- 

 dence and seemed jealous of invasion, but 

 gradually the lines of separation disap- 

 peared and the effect of the contact 

 proved harmonious and charming. 



Let me tell you some of my own early 

 experience in this direction gathered from 

 my boyhood's garden of sixty years ago. 



I could not quite share my next door 

 neighbor's preference for the unvarying 

 round of annual seed sowing, the formal 

 rows of mignonette and mullein pinks, of 

 coreopsis and four o'clocks, of sweet basil 

 and ragged edge sailor, nor for the prim 

 edgings of box — the clump of southern- 

 wood and the border of chives or 

 moss pinks. My own garden favorites 

 were quite as much those of the woods 

 and the pastures, and one after another 

 of the rustics was brought home from 

 botanizing or fishing excursions, and 

 given a place in the garden, sometimes 

 even crowding out the more aristocratic 

 occupants. 



The results soon became pleasing to the 

 eye and even surprising. The wild violets 

 doubled in size and improved in color. 

 The exquisite "Dutchman's breeches" 

 outstripped in beauty, its cultivated 

 cousins adlumia and dielytra; the "Jack- 

 in-the-pulpit" sent up his gigantic stems 

 to overtop his calla relatives; the blood- 

 roots and hepaticas and anemones were 

 welcomed from the woods and showed 

 their gratitude by a two weeks' earlier 

 bloom than was their wild habit, and 

 were conspicuous and gay even before 

 the moss pink began to glow in the bor- 

 der. In the lily-ot-the-valley patch I in- 

 troduced the wild convallarias, the Solo- 

 mon's- seal of several species, and all 

 thrived and bloom d together in exquisite 

 variety. The wild iris stood bravely by 

 the side of her Persian and German sis- 

 ters, never quite forgetting her inferiority, 

 but greatly improved in size and color. 

 The pyroleas and the acteas from the 

 damp pine woods raised their showy 

 heads above the bed of periwinkles, the 

 harebell took its place among the choice 

 campanulas, the trilliums, came in with 

 the Mayapple, crowding out some old 

 cultivated residents of long standing and 

 carpeting the shrubbery with their star- 

 spangled foliage. 



Wild shrubs also, as well as herbaceous 

 plants were admitted to the new com- 

 panionship. The wild spiraeas respond 

 readily to care and are quite as attractive 



as some of the cultivated species. The 

 clethra doubles the length of its sweet 

 racemes under cultivation; the wild althea 

 from the salt meadows soon forgets the 

 briny soil in which it grew, and thrives 

 equally and even better, in rich garden 

 mould, and the wild senna and indigo are 

 both ea-ilv grown and very attractive in 

 the shrubbery, and the bayberry, under 

 generous culture, becomes one of our fin- 

 est evergreens; it is only rivalled by the 

 southern pittosporum, which it much 

 resembles. And so on, Mr. Editor, indef- 

 initely, and this is only a single experi- 

 ence. H w easy to enlarge, vary and 

 improve with local material, and with a 

 little individual taste and a willingness 

 to depart from conventional ru es — thus 

 making variety a feature of gardening 

 which shall be instructive as well as 

 pleasing! 



To invert this process, and to carry our 

 garden flowers to the woods is another 

 branch of wild gardening and the one to 

 which Mr. Robinson chiefly devotes him- 

 self i i his admirable book. Thus the 

 woodland shrubbery is enriched with 

 bulbs of all kinds, and lilies, campanulas, 

 foxgloves and other garden favorites go 

 out to adorn the edges of the forest 

 thickets. It must be remembered that 

 Mr. Robinson deals with English nark 

 grounds, and not with our more natural 

 American landscape. Still the book is 

 crammed with wise and practical sug- 

 gestions and every page is full of interest. 

 But I am encroaching on your space, and 

 will only add my strong appeal that you 

 will continue to encourage your mai^ 

 readers in trying to do a little wild gar- 

 dening and to find out for themselves 

 some of its instructive lessons, and its 

 manifold charms. 



J. M. Barstow, M. D. 



New York, November 10, '96. 



FLOWER GARDEN NOTES. 



Queen of the Earlies Aster (white), 

 sown about the last of February in the 

 greenhouse and planted out early came 

 into bloom the last of May; it was fol- 

 lowed by Queen of the Market, then other 

 varieties and open-airsowings,sothatwe 

 have had asters in bloom in the garden 

 ever since June 1 and the sowing of June 

 20 is still in good cutting condition, having 

 withstood several frosts. The blight, so de- 

 structive to the midseason asters, appear- 

 ing with us this year for the first, did not 

 affect the earlier or later sowings. 



A border of early flowering chrysanthe- 

 mums eclipses in brilliancy all other gar- 

 den displays of the year, and partly dis- 

 budded, presents some handsome though 

 not very large individual flowers. They 

 excite much admiration, make fine bou- 

 quets in vases, are in nearly all the colors 

 and shades common to the chrysanthe- 

 mum, and even if they should not prove 

 hardy will be well worth growing as an 

 annual. The seed was started early 

 inside. 



Barnard's Perpetual Lobelia has the 

 finest flowers of any trailing kind we have 

 yet seen; intense dark blue with large 

 white eye. Goldelse is a very pretty low 

 growing yellow leaved variety, has hand- 

 some flowers and makes a nice edging. 



Pyrethrum Aureum "Moss" is another 

 new, finely cut, golden-leaved edging 

 plant, which for two years has shown no 

 tendency to run to seed. 



Salvia potens, from seed or roots, set 

 rather closely because of the few flowers 

 which open at once, will give perhaps the 

 intensest mass of blue obtainable. It 

 grows two or three feet high and is also 

 available for cutting. 



We have had no more satisfactory 



