RUBIACEAE 121 
Japanese vegetable (they eat the young shoots, boiled like 
Asparagus), one of the most superbient of hardy herbaceous 
foliage plants, growing eight feet high or more in the 
season, with rich, Ailantus-like foliage, and quite splendid 
for any bold commanding point. Aralia japonica and 
Aralia Sieboldit ought to be used in the same way. For 
certainly, if you get them from anywhere near Tokio, 
they must necessarily be as hardy as daisies. 
Asperula Athoa rejoices in many aliases: some call it 
suberosa, some athoa, some arcadiensis. At least I have 
received one species, always, under these three names. I 
like best to think of it as fellow-countryman to Arcadian 
Atalanta, snowy-souled, though often, in my garden, must 
the plant have repeated its compatriot’s plaint : 
*T would that with feet, 
Unsandalled, unshod, 
Overbold, overfleet, 
I had swam not nor trod, 
From Arcadia to Calydon northward, a blast 
of the envy of God.’ 
For no matter in how warm, light, and well-drained a nook 
you may place this frail southerner, it is always liable to 
suffer from winter damps. Not for many summers in suc- 
cession will you see those brittle little greyish branches, 
crowned with their profusion of long rosy trumpets. How- 
ever, my plants are now breaking more robustly than ever, 
and, if the slugs can be warned off, will soon be stronger 
clumps than before. So that care and cosseting have 
this time availed. And who need grudge them to Asper- 
ula Athoa? Other pretty Woodruffs are our two natives, 
cynanchica and odorata, the first for high and dry 
places, the other most admissible to a low, unprofitable 
corner out of harm’s way. And close to these comes the 
dainty American Bluets, Houstonia coerulea, only a few 
inches high, with pale blue stars all the summer through. 
