MORE OF THE SMALLER BOG-PLANTS 249 
lives a small Aroid, with arrow-shaped leaves of glossy 
green, and queer little chocolate blossoms, whose hood 
prolongs itself into an immense feeler. The whole effect 
of the flower is that of a mouse, with waving tail, diving 
down some hole. Indeed the resemblance of Arisarum 
proboscideum to the agitated hinder-end of an escaping 
mouse is almost ridiculous. But this little plant, native 
of such arid dry corners in so arid and dry a country, 
must needs be of the most difficult culture in a moist cool 
climate like mine? Will it be believed that by one of 
Nature’s incalculable freaks, Arisarum proboscideum is 
not only one of the best plants I know, but grows quite 
beside itself in the most sopping parts of the bog; 
forming into great mats and beds of emerald arrows, 
among which the diving brown mice frisk and sport in 
the most exciting manner, waving their tails in every 
direction. And though not showy, this freakish little 
weird plant stands very high in my affections, not only 
for its rare quaintness, as for its unparalleled, unhoped-for 
adaptability. I have it everywhere now, in a hundred 
wet, damp, or dry, shady corners, always in rich soil, and 
in every exposure. And always it does best of all in full 
sun in the wettest marsh, though hardly less glossy and 
triumphant on the rock-work under the shadow of great 
boulders, in stiff retentive ground. 
Of the other Aroids I have little to say. <Arisarum 
triphyllum from Japan will be handsome when I have 
succeeded in establishing it on good shady corners of the 
rock. It grows a foot high or more, with one or two 
very graceful three-cleft, claw-like leaves, and a long- 
tailed flower like an exaggerated Arisarum. Larger still 
is Arum crinitum, my only Arum, a magnificent foliage 
plant for a very hot sheltered place in dry rich soil, 
growing four feet high and more in a dense clump, and 
emitting, in early summer, enormous flowers of a dense 
