WAHLENBERGIA. 



habit, but because the average size of its largest flowers is hardly 

 larger than that of pumilws smallest. 



W. serpyllifolia has a much wider range than these last, up and 

 down the hills of Servia and Bosnia. It is by far the most splendid 

 of all, especially in the form that originated at Ingleborough, and has 

 to be called W. s. major, because it possesses great satiny-purple bells 

 of twice the size of any other form, even though the wild type be so 

 ready and hearty in cultivation that it alwa}'s develops finer blossoms 

 than in naturo. It may always be known by the loose flopping habit 

 of its smooth, rich, red-purple stems of 5 or 6 inches, springing out on 

 all sides in early summer from the central rosette of oval little green 

 lucent leaves, fringed with hairs at the edge, but otherwise quite 

 smooth and glossy except in the rare hairy variety, W. s. pilosula. 

 At the end of the stems in early June, hanging in a mass over the 

 edge of a warm limestone rock, develops a corrugated bud of reddish 

 varnished black, which opens into an upstaring bell of the most ful- 

 minating imperial violet, in a texture like the finest shimmering silken 

 lining to the Emperor's robe. The blaze and glory is Byzantine in 

 its sumptuousness ; unfortunately, however, it is not Byzantine in the 

 longevity of its majesty ; but in a fortnight all is over, and the plant 

 does no more except make shoots that can be freely made into 

 cuttings. It is of astonishing ease and good temper in the garden ; 

 but seems eager for more cosy conditions than the arid chips of the 

 moraine. It grows its heartiest indeed (in tangles of shoots often a 

 foot across) in a sunny aspect, in very rich and light limy loam, which 

 should be well watered all through the summer and spring, and should, 

 of course, be as perfectly drained as every other part of the garden. 

 Its best place is on a slope or ledge at eye-level, where the regal bells 

 can immediately affront your vision with the full dominance of their 

 display ; a particularly good association is with Saxifraga cochlearis 

 or S. 1. lanloscana ; let these occupy the back of the ledge, and then 

 their snowy plumes will be waving in the precise moment when, in 

 front, the violet cups of the Wahlenbergia are overflowing the bed, in 

 rich droppings of purple down the face of its rim of rock. 



W. Murbeckii leads on from the last towards the Cluster-heads ; 

 and is probably a hybrid between Edraianthus Kitaibeli and W. ser- 

 pyllifolia. It has much smaller and more pointed leaves than this 

 last, and the violet bells on their single stems have five or six widening 

 pale bracts just below, while between the lobes of the calyx there is 

 the little toothed appendage which is usually lacking in W. serpylli- 

 folia, always lacking hi W. Oweriniana, always present in W. pumilio, 

 W. dinarica, and Ed. Kitaibeli (in complete or modified form). The 



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