130 FLOWERING SHRUBS 



So much in request as Cranberries are for household use, it seems 

 strange that no enterprising person has yet undertaken to supply the 

 markets of Canada. In suitable soil the crop could hardly prove a 

 failure, with care and attention to the selection of the plants at a proper 

 season. 



The Cranberry belongs to one of the suborders of the Heath family 

 ( Ericacece ), nor are its delicate pink-tinted flowers less beautiful than 

 many of the exotic plants of that Order, which we rear with care and 

 pains in the green-house and conservatory ; yet, growing in our midst 

 as it were, few persons that luxuriate in the rich preserve that is made 

 from the ripe fruit, have ever seen the elegant trailing-plant, with its 

 graceful blossoms and myrtle-like foliage. 



The botanical name is of Greek origin, from oxi/s, sour, and coccus^ 

 a berry. The plant thrives best in wet sandy soil and low mossy 

 marshes. 



\\'ii,i.ow-LEAVED Meadow'-sweet. — Spivtea salicj folia ^ (L.) 



Frederic Pursh, in his North American Flora — a valuable work 

 but little referred to — gives no less than seven different species of this 

 Genus Spir;^a as natives of Canada ; the description of two or three will 

 be sufficient for the present limited work on the indigenous shrubs of 

 this portion of the Dominion. Of the white flowered species, Spinca 

 saliiifolia, the ^Villow-leaved Meadow-sweet is the most commonly met 

 with, and is often found in gardens and shrubberies. It is a pretty, 

 graceful shrub, with clustered feathery panicles of white or pale waxy- 

 pink flowers, which are terminal on slender branches ; the leaves long, 

 narrow and thin, of a pale green, serrated on the margins. Our Spiraeas 

 will not only bear removal to the garden, but flourish luxuriantly under 

 cultivation. The only objection to their introduction to our borders is 

 that they arc apt to become too intrusive, by throwing up many suckers, 

 which have to be rooted out. 



A very slender variety, with simple wand-like stems and terminal 

 spikes of small white flowers, may be found growing among the cracks 

 and fissures of the rocky shores of Stoney Lake and its numerous islets, 

 rooting in sterile s])ots among the few wild grasses that find nurture in 

 the scanty mould that is lodged in such crevices. This delicate little 

 shrub may be found in flower all through the hot months of July and 

 August. The Spinx^as belong to the Rose family. 'I'he popular name, 

 Meadow-sweet, seems hardly appropriate to our pretty shrub, as it has 

 very little fragrance. But this name for the whole Genus is taken from 

 the beautiful and odoriferous British species, Spinca Ulmaria. 



