104 ALPINES AND BOG-PLANTS 
are so close to Malva as to be almost synonymous. Only 
involucrata is usually grown, and my experience with 
involucrata has not tempted me to try any other. For 
one thing, the plant is another sun- and heat-loving 
North American, extremely petulant about any undue 
moisture : for another, its colour aroused in me a pained 
dislike ; for I could never have imagined so burning and 
acrid a magenta. (‘The same objection applies to Calan- 
drinia umbellata and the Calandrinias generally; miffy 
plants in any damp climate, and of a gorgeously horrible 
colour—all the worse for being so gorgeous.) Therefore 
I lost Callirhoé and Calandrinia with feelings akin to 
pleasure. 
Of the Geraniums there are two exquisite Alpines, 
besides lancastriense. Geraniwm argenteum is a Pyren- 
ean, who grows about six or eight inches high in a neat 
tuft. His claw-like leaves are all grey and silver; his 
big blossoms of a soft delicate pink, with deeper veining. 
He blooms perpetually, and is quite happy if you give 
him a well-drained chink, and leave him alone. He dis- 
likes being moved; and he also dislikes any excess of 
damp anywhere near him. But he is altogether as easy 
as he is beautiful, and his worst fault is that he is a very 
bad seed-bearer, and this is all the bitterer because he is 
even more impossible to multiply by division. Geranium 
cinereum is very near him in every way, but a trifle larger, 
a trifle less dainty, a trifle less brilliant, and a trifle more 
generally robust. Cinereum is, as it were, Nature’s rough 
model for argentewm, which for loveliness, charm, and 
adaptability to any fair culture, takes very high rank 
among the alpines of my special favour. 
Among the larger Geraniums the most appalling con- 
fusion reigns. So I go delicately, as Pilgrim on the 
narrow way, or Mrs. Gamp on her ‘ parapidge.’ There 
is, first of all, a very robust, rampageous, dwarfish person 
