>AXIFRAGA. 



the same tradition. It thrives as readily as all this group in the same 

 conditions, but is not the equal of S. Haussmannii in amplitude and 

 though freer, smaller, and more spreading in growth. 



S. x n panda is a hybrid of S. Geian. q.v. 



turn is the most precious jewel of the Porphyrions. It is a 

 neat and creeping miniature, to be seen only on the highest granitic 

 moors of the Graians. Cottians, and Maritimes (also through the Alps of 

 Salzburg to the Carpathians on the one hand, and Westward to the 

 Pyrenees on the other), lying over the sere brown turf like dropped 

 necklaces of living ruby. It suggests a very* fine and frail S. oppositi- 

 folia in habit, creeping flat in densely matted shoots in the sparse 

 moorland herbage, packed close with pairs of tiny oval leaves, dark- 

 green, glossy and leathery, from which abundantly stand up little 

 brave stems of 2 or 3 inches, carrying some half a dozen flowers in a 

 head, rather starry in the petal, so that the effect is of a short and 

 fluffy rosy spike. For the petals are pink, and the spraying stamens 

 of a yet brighter shade, so that the whole head has a delicate and 

 feathery brilliancy of colour and effect. And forms of yet more 

 special radiance may be discovered among the abundant type in 

 the highest places of the Southern granites in July ; that called 

 8. return maritime is merely trying to explain that it came from the 

 Maritime Alps, not at all that it wants to live in the sea. In cultiva- 

 tion this species, though so high an alpine, though so limited in 

 distribution, and non -calcareous in taste, proves by far the easiest of 



j:oup — an even more certain thriver and flowerer than S. oppositi- 

 folia in man}- places, having no fads about soil, but liking best a rather 

 cool mixture of spongy porous peat and loam and chips, in a corner of 

 the garden not too sunburnt, and adequately supplied with water. 

 Here it will continue to grow on quite happily from year to year 

 without further notice, and send up its dainty 2-inch cluster-heads of 

 spidery red and rose towards middle and later summer. 



8. x Beyeri is a natural hybrid of S. sedoeides and S. tendla. It is a 

 greenish-flowered little high-alpine of no value. 



8. x rhaetica is a hybrid of the Aeizoon group, to be found in the 



t — a plant of fine growth and ample port, not unlike 



that of S. Hostii, and of similar heartiness, though perhaps of less 



'.!. And indeed, since every rock-garden is now a compendium 



of all earthly Alps, so far as Saxifraga is concerned, these natural 



hybrid- or intermediate species hovering on the edge of S. Cotyledon, 



crustata have lost a great deal of 

 their va! □ for the intrinsic interest that each may possess. 



But when S. '. agulata take a hand, the garden 



308 



