PRIMULA. 



from one to four wide -rimmed bells of rich and brilliant blue, upturned 

 or nodding, stemless in their head, and shining with inimitable brilliance 

 on the emerald moss-cushions which it occupies in the face of the high 

 damp rocks and grit -banks, bringing out its jewels in the first moment 

 when the snows begin to melt. It should clearly be welcomed to the 

 choicest place in the Gentian-bed, should be kept sedulously dry in 

 winter, and not in any case be counted upon, even after the 

 most successful summer, to prove perfectly perennial. (Sikkmi- 

 Himalaya.) 



P. saxaiilis, Komarow, is the species almost universally in culti- 

 vation as P. cortusoeides (not P. Sieboldii). It is also P. oreodoxa of 

 gardens, but not P. patens (Turcz), which is P. Sieboldii. Under any 

 name it is a pleasant easy thing of ready spreading habit, with 

 masses of rather limp-stemmed foliage after the fashion of all the 

 Cortusoeides group, and then sending up an endless profusion of tall 

 naked -looking 10-inch stems far above the leaves, which stay flopping 

 and flagging down below. The flowers, in generous heads, are round 

 and cheery in their shades of pinky-mauve. From all forms of P. 

 cortusoeides the plant may be told by the fact that each flower here 

 has a very long foot-stalk of its own (so that the head is quite loose), 

 while hi P. cortusoeides they are very short indeed, and the head 

 therefore much tighter. It ranges right across the rocky woods of 

 Northern Asia to Alaska, and has been in cultivation for more than a 

 century ; the " doyen " of all specimens has lived in the botanical 

 gardens at Berlin ever since 1806. It can be divided as frequently 

 and freely as the rest of the group, and seeds with unparalleled 

 profusion. 



P. saxifra-gifolia is a form of P. cuneifolia, and a delicate pretty 

 little thing, from the Aleutians, Alaska, and Unalaska. 



P. Schlagintweiiiana is a neater thing than its name, suggesting a 

 powderless P. farinosa at first glance, the many-flowered head of 

 graceful blossoms being carried high above the tidy incurving rosettes 

 of oval-rounded leaves, on stems of some 3 or 4 inches. Its real 

 relation is to P. dent'culata, while from P. glabra it may, among other 

 points, be distinguished by the longer flower-tube. The calyx, too, 

 folds into a sort of minute pocket at the base between each lobe. 

 (Kashmir and the Western Himalaya.) 



P. scotica is a smaller form of the type P. farinosa, with fatter 

 foliage, shorter stems, and rather larger golden-eyed flowers of deeper 

 purple tone. It is P. farinosa Warei (Stein), for which laments are 

 sometimes heard. P. sc tica is stocky and pretty ; though a miff, 

 it will seed freely, even if the seeds take a year to germinate ; it wants 



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