360 



* GARDENING. 



Aug. 15 



I have grown it successfully iu full sun on 

 Long Island. Statice latiiolia is an old 

 plant, very hardy and sure to flower 

 every season. When once planted it may 

 remain for years without disturbance 

 and will send up stronger flower stems 

 and more of them every season. The 

 sprays are useful in a dried state as well 

 as freshly cut. Malva moschata and the 

 variety alba are both capital border 

 plants. The great mass of flowers they 

 produce from every joint of the many 

 stems is surprising, coming out for weeks 

 in uninterrupted succession. A sunny 

 place and deep soil is best for its welfare. 



Montbretias are not herbaceous plants 

 but are perfectly hardy and have flow- 

 ered for some weeks, blooming until Sep- 

 tember or even later. They should be 

 introduced freely among the earlier flow- 

 ering plants. They will come up annu- 

 ally stronger and thicker and produce 

 many branchy spikes, set with their 

 handsome and brilliantly colored flowers. 

 Scarlet, crimson, yellow, in various 

 shades and in combinations are represent- 

 ed among them. The foliage is gladiolus- 

 like but much smaller and the plant, when 

 in flower, has a more graceful appearance. 

 Lychnis chalcedonica alba lasts longer 

 in perfection than the ordinary scarlet. 

 It does not grow so tall as the older 

 kinds and usuallj' sends up more flower 

 stems. L vespertina plena, another 

 white-flowering species, with a loose and 

 spready habit, is in bloom continuously 

 until late in fall. It is still a rare plant 

 and not offered anywhere in quantity, 

 owing to difficulties experienced in propa- 

 gation. 



Salvia farinacea is a very free flowering 

 border plant, with a tomentose white 

 calyx and light violet-blue corolla, a very 

 pleasing color combination. The flower 

 spikes are long and many flowered and 

 the plant has a clean and neat habit, 

 forming a branchy bush 2 to 3 feet high. 

 A most desirable subject for the border; 

 requires sunlight and rather rich soil to 

 do its best. Inula macrocephala, a bold 

 looking plant 3V2 to 4 feet high with large 

 golden vellow flowers and large entire 

 oblong leaves, taller and more robust in 

 growth than I. glandulosa, blooms until 

 September and is a fine subject for the 

 lawn or for the back part of a wide 

 border. Clematis Davidiana with its 

 axillary clusters of blue hyacinth like 

 flowers is fully out. It is seen to best ad- 

 vantage when planted as an isolated 

 specimen in the lawn, where it forms a 

 rounded bush about three feet high and 

 blooms for a long time. 



Erythrsea diffusa, is a neat little tufted 

 plant with bright rose-colored flowers, 

 which are produced in great profusion 

 during summer. It grows only about 3 

 inches high, should have light sandy soil 

 and will succeed equally well near the 

 front of the border or in a rockery when 

 not shaded too much. Cimicifuga race- 

 mosa is sending up its long slender spikes 

 of white flowers. The spira-a-like foliage 

 is perfect in spite of the great heat it had 

 to endure early in July. Campanula ro- 

 tundifolia and C. carpathica in variety, 

 continue to flower very freely, so does 

 Dicentra eximea, and D. formosa Trol- 

 lius europseus, and T. asiaticus are now 

 sending up a second crop of flower stems 

 and appear now as if they would bloom 

 until frost. 



Rudbeckia maxima is now only begin- 

 ning to open its first flowers while other 

 species have been fully out for more than 

 a month. Erodium manescavi is pretty 

 and attractive with its purplish red clus- 

 ters of flowers, which last so long in per- 

 fection. The foliage is divided into nar- 



row and deeply cut segments and is very 

 ornamental. Erodiums belong to the 

 geranium family and should have light 

 soil and a sunny position either in the 

 border or on a rockery, but with us they 

 require a slight protection in severe win- 

 ters. 



Buphthalmum salcifolium has main- 

 branchy slender stems clothed with nar- 

 row small willow-like leaves. The flow- 

 ers are brilliant yellow and of good size; 

 a very neat plant about 2 feet high, 

 requires a rather dry and sunny position 

 but succeeds tolerably well in any ordi- 

 nary garden soil. Chrysocoma linosyria, 

 "Golden Locks," are covered with yellow 

 flowers, a pretty plant which should be 

 grown more generally, it requires but lit- 

 tle care and is entirely hardy. Draco- 

 cephalums are still in fine condition; blue 

 is a desirable color in the borders and the 

 habit is all we can desire in a dense grow- 

 ing ground or rock-covering plant. 



Rochester, N. Y. J. B. Keller. 



L1L1UM HENRYI. 



This new lily, lately introduced from 

 the mountains of China, is in flower with 

 us for the first time and a welcome addi- 

 tion it is to this class of bulbous plants. 

 It seems to be one of the hardiest and 

 strongest of growers and is sure to be 

 largely grown when better known. It 

 begins to grow early in spring and care 

 has to be taken that late frosts in spring 

 do not harm the stems, as they seem to 

 be very tender in their early stage of 

 growth, in fact ours were cut by the frost 

 we had in the early part of May, but we 

 were able to save one and we are now 

 rewarded with a stem carrying 17 flow- 

 ers. 



With us this lily has grown a little over 

 four feet high, but it is said to grow six 

 when well established. The foliage is 

 large and dark green, not unlike longiflo- 

 rum. The flowers are of good size, the 

 color yellow lightly spotted with a band 

 of green around each petal. It resembles 

 L. speciosum somewhat, in fact it is cata- 

 logued by some firms as the yellow speci- 

 osum. David Fraser. 



BOCCONIfl GORDflTfl. 



I note in your August 1st number, 

 what Mr. Egan says of the Bocconia cor- 

 data as being perfectly hardy. Until my 

 experience with it last winter I supposed 

 it so, but here it was killed down about 

 a foot. Not a particle of the plant that 

 was not under a foot of soil or protected 

 by some covering equal to this, was alive 

 this spring. But below this foot of soil 

 were left pieces of the root which were 

 alive, and though it is not so strong and 

 will not attain its usual height this sea- 

 son, it is in bloom from these lower por- 

 tions of root. In one or two other placee 

 on my grounds, however, where the boc- 

 conia had gotten in from scattered seed, 

 though the plants were not so old, the 

 roots not having penetrated so d.ep, it 

 was entirely killed and has not started 

 at all this season. This was of course an 

 exceptional winter for I have had it for 

 years before this and none of it was 

 affected by the cold. 



F H. Horsford. 



Charlotte, Vt. 



The Cold=Frame. 



PLANTS IN COLD FRflMBS. 



There are numerous letters and articles 

 in Gardening on the subject of cold- 



frames, but they are not explicit enough 

 for amateurs as to their management. 

 My frame is about two feet below and 

 one foot above the ground, faces the south, 

 has protection on the north and is well 

 drained. 



I desire to know how to treat the 

 following plants: 1. Seedling penste- 

 mons; some growing in the open ground 

 and some in pots. 2. Seedling Lobelia 

 Victoria, growing like No. 1. 3. Wall 

 flowers, two years old. 4. Tritomas. 

 5. Oxalis floribunda rosea. 6. Delphi- 

 nium nudicaule; seedlings, some of which 

 have commenced to bloom, others very 

 small. 7. Myosotis. S. Epimediums. 

 9. Calampelis. 



According to a foreign catalogue "the 

 roots of Lobelia Victoria should be taken 

 up like dahlias," but I hesitate to treat 

 seedlings in that way. 1 kept a few last 

 winter in a cold grapery by simply pot- 

 ting and covering them, and they did 

 fairly well. Calampelis bids fair to be 

 an excellent and useful vine. It has 

 already grown this summer from seed 

 at least twelve feet, and numerous strong 

 lateral branches. The foliage is delicate 

 and pretty and the flowers resemble in 

 color and form those of the Delphinium 

 nudicaule; according to Henderson it 

 should be protected in a cold-frame. 



I propose to bed all the plants named 

 in the frame in about six or eight inches 

 of sand and I desire to know: 1. Whether 

 they should be first cut down and to what 

 extent. 2. Whether they should be 

 covered, say with peat moss, and to what 

 depth. 3. Whether they should be so 

 bedded before or after they have been 

 touched with frost. 4. Whether they 

 should have extra protection in very 

 severe weather. 5. To what extent they 

 should be exposed to the sun. 6. Whether 

 they should be allowed to grow in the 

 frame in early spring or kept back as 

 much as possible until planted out. 



I have plenty of peat moss and can pro- 

 tect plants in the open ground to almost 

 any extent. Perhaps in the case of some 

 of the plants you w-iuld advise me to do 

 so. 



My gardener recently cut down my 

 paonias to within a foot of the ground. 

 I fear that this will prevent the formation 

 of crowns and that I shall have no bloom 

 next year. Am I right? R. M. W. 



Toronto. 



Concerning cold-frames and their man- 

 agement we may say that the frame he 

 has now will answer for wintering his 

 hardy or half-hardy plants, though there 

 is no necessity of having it so deep; 15 to 

 18 inches from the glass is ample depth 

 for this purpose. Plants in very deep 

 frames are more liable to rot than those 

 in shallower structures. Such things as 

 Lobelia Victoria, Delphinium nudicaule, 

 myosotis and epimediums would very 

 likely prove perfectly hardy in his lati- 

 tude, though a slight covering may be 

 applied in November or the beginning of 

 December. Earlier covering should not 

 be practiced in herbaceous borders. 

 Wait until the ground is frozen an inch 

 deep or so and the winter has set in for 

 good; never cover very thickly; loose, 

 long material is better than compact and 

 short stuff; we should protect rather 

 against the rays of the sun and the dry- 

 ing winds, especially during February 

 and March. 



With tritomas it is different. Their 

 roots are tender and will suffer seriously 

 in frozen ground. A cellar or a root 

 house is a safe place for them; here they 

 may be placed thickly together in boxes, 

 their roots covered and embedded in soil 



