52 ALPINES AND BOG-PLANTS 
of maturity. ‘The Adonises are quite easy to cultivate, 
but I rather hope, by now, that I have lost or parted 
with all mine. 
Paeonia and Delphinium, those very gorgeous persons, 
are not, of course, suited to the small rock-garden. But 
hard indeed must be the heart that can exclude them. 
The species of Delphinium that I have grown are dictyo- 
carpum, scopulorum, and tatsienense. Of these tatsien- 
ense is so immeasurably the best, that I shall let the 
others go without replacing them. Tatstenense grows 
anywhere in the sun, is about a foot or eighteen inches 
high, and produces clouds of bright blue flowers on 
graceful branching stems. I have also wrestled with 
cardinale and nudicaule, the two scarlet species. The 
sun-loving, delicate Californian mwdicaule has been an 
utter failure here. Cardinale, also a Californian, seems a 
better plant, but I cannot really do it justice until I 
have given a good trial to the stout little seedlings that 
I now have ready to go out. Of better-known species, 
I will only say that the tall Hybrids are glorious for 
high places on the rock-work, and that the dwarf, 
Delphinium grandiflorum, has the largest flowers and the 
most brilliantly splendid blue. The old Belladonna, too, 
is among the best, small enough for the rock-garden, 
bearing loose spires of big blossoms, tender in their 
Cambridge blue as the sky of early morning. This 
delight thrives anywhere, but very rarely seeds. There 
is also a white form of grandiflorum and an exquisite 
gentian-, or pale sky-coloured form, as there is also 
of its twin, cashmerianum grandiflorum. And all are 
perfectly easy to grow. 
Paconia wittmaniana is a rarity, a herbaceous species 
with big sulphur-yellow flowers, which, like all the 
1 They throve robustly, and sent up stalwart spikes. And then the 
slugs came and ate every one of them clean down to the ground. 
