FLOWERING SHRUBS AND'-TREES, AND THEIR ARTISTIC USE. 121 



dendron, Sweet Gale, Star bush, and various Laurustinus, leaving out 

 not a few which thrive only in the warmer districts. Charming 

 gardens might be made of such bushes, not lumped together, but 

 in open groups, with the more beautiful American hardy flowers 

 between them, such as the Wood Lily and Mocassin flower, many 

 rare Lilies, and beautiful bulbous flowers of all seasons. The light and 

 shade and variety in such beds of choice evergreens and flowers 

 mingled are charming, and the plan would be a permanent one as it 

 would tend to abolish the never-ending digging in the flower garden. 

 Beds of flowering shrubs in the flower garden are not always so well 

 suited for small gardens ; but in bold ones, now naked in winter, it 

 would make them sightly even at that season, and much easier to deal 

 with in early summer. 



The Rhododendrons of the hybrid sorts are too much used, and, as 

 they are nearly always grafted, the common stock that bears them in 

 the end kills the plant it should support, and so we too often see the 

 common pontic kind. Yet there are many beautiful things among 

 these hybrids. The good colours are well worth picking out from them, 

 and the aim of the planter should be to show the habit and form of the 

 plant. This does not mean that they may not be grouped or massed 

 just as before, but openings of all sizes should be left among them for 

 light and shade, and for handsome herbaceous plants that die down in 

 the winter, thus allowing the full light for half the year to evergreens. 



In the south and west the various Arbutus are charming for lawns 

 and ravines, and for sheltering the flower garden, as is also the sweet 

 Bay Laurel, but the common Cherry Laurel and the Portugal should 

 not be planted near anything precious. 



The hardy Azaleas are, considering their great number and variety, 

 perhaps the most precious flowering shrubs we have ; they are fine in 

 form of bush, even when they get little freedom, and superb in colour, 

 the foliage in autumn, too, being rich in colour in sunny places. The 

 Hydrangeas are noble plants in warm valleys, and on soils where they 

 are not too often cut down by the winter ; not only the common one 

 of the markets, which, in soils where it turns blue, is so effective in 

 the garden, but a variety of good kinds, among which should always 

 be the oak-leaved Hydrangea, as old plants of it are so handsome. 

 As these are plants that cannot be grown everywhere, this is a 

 good reason why they should be made much of where the climate 

 suits them. There are few garden sights more interesting than groups 

 of Hydrangeas well grown and placed, and it is one we rarely see. 



The Brooms have many effective plants and none more so than 

 the common and the Spanish Brooms, which should be massed on 

 banks, or where they will come into the picture, and some of the 

 smaller Brooms are excellent for rock-gardens. The Furze in all its 



