PRIMULA. 



see them. Therefore, in asking him for guidance the gardener will 

 not only be gaining profit, but giving pleasure also — a holy and a 

 pleasing thought. In yet other districts of those Alps the most lovely 

 varieties of P. marginata may also be seen, that make even the lovely 

 common type seem like silver in the time of Solomon. Some or many 

 of these will often be offered under pompous names at high prices ; 

 the gardener may hereby learn that if he chooses to take his summer 

 holiday in that direction in May, he will be able to fill his garden with a 

 hundred forms as good and better, for the mero trouble of taking his 

 feet to the level of its rocks — where it is not necessary, indeed, to 

 collect it by the root, since a few trunks pulled off here and there from 

 the undisturbed mass will immediately strike fibre for themselves 

 if sent home and reasonably treated. Culture already knows a white 

 variety which is rather squinny and pink and impure ; but the 

 personal eye will always offer, the best satisfaction to the personal 

 taste, which in this case runs less risk than usual, seeing that there 

 is no form of P. marginata that is not of delightful charm and as 

 easy of culture as couch-grass. Of hybrids the plant has yielded 

 sevoral beauties of the first rank. Linda Pope bears the name of the 

 species, but has clearly other blood in her, though this has not spoiled 

 her free and spreading habit, and the leathery toothed beauty of the 

 grey powdered leaves ; while she also has blossoms of a quite especial 

 size and amplitude, especially rich in soft clear blueness, and with a 

 quite special round white eye of powder — a rare treasure at present, but 

 one of the highest value. Then there is P. x marven, a hybrid between 

 this species and P. x venusta, itself a hybrid of P. auricula and P. 

 carniolica. From parentage so splendid a noble and a thrifty beauty 

 is bom — a thing of the easiest temper anywhere on the rock-work, 

 with the grey leathern leafage of P. marginata, but taller stems 

 carrying slightly smaller flowers, more round and numerous, of a 

 sumptuous pure violet -purple with an eye of white, in loose heads on 

 the stout stalks. This not only comes copiously from cuttings, but 

 also seems fertile in seed. In nature hybrids were long looked for in 

 vain, until at last 1913 yielded in the Cottian ranges a most regal 

 intermediate which is to bear the name of P. x Cruris, Bowles. Fur 

 on certain passes P. marginata dwells among the stones and cliffs and 

 mossy plan s, v> liile about among the roots of the pine-trees luxuriates 

 aid a notably full-faced and beautiful form of P. viscosa. And 

 here accordingly, after >• ars of doubt, it has been discovered that the 

 two species in the same sub-section of their family will interbreed. 

 /'. x Cruet its its full description ; of P. marginata, howevi r. it 



has the habil (though more tufted and less procumbent), no less than 



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