650 



LIGUSTRUM. 



THE ENGLISH FLOWER GARDEN. 



LIGUSTRUM. 



Ligustrur 



flower garden. Caucasus. L. sibirica, 

 Fischeri, and thyrsoidea are fine-leaved 

 plants, and worth growing with L. macro- 

 phylla for their foliage. The Japanese 

 species, L. Kasmpferi and Hodgsoni, are 

 better grown under glass, except in 

 summer, when they may be used among 

 fine-leaved plants in the sub-tropical 

 garden ; but the hardy kinds are most 

 interesting. Svn., Senecio. 



LIGUSTRUM {Privet).— i:\i^ meanest 

 of all mean shrubs, I think, but popular 

 beyond all others, its weed-like facility 

 of increase making it dear to those to 

 whom something growing with a fungus- 

 like rapidity is a treasure. It is not only 

 that Privets are poor 

 in themselves, and, as 

 a rule, without beauty 

 of leaf or flower, but 

 it is the number of 

 beautiful shrubs they 

 shut out, millions be- 

 ing annually sold to 

 take the places of 

 better things, and help- 

 ing to kill the few that 

 are planted near them 

 or among them. The 

 commoner sorts have 

 no beauty whatever, 

 and they all have the 

 same vile odour in 

 summer days when 

 they flower, a sickly 

 smell. Happy in the 

 possession of the finest 

 hedging and fencing 

 plants of the northern 

 world, quick, holly, box, yew and sweet 

 briar, nurserymen and jobbing garden- 

 ers make hedges and fences with these 

 wretched privets, fences which have the 

 one poor quality of rapid growth, but 

 which a man, let alone a beast, could walk 

 through without effort. I have seen 

 whole towns like Leicester with miles of 

 these poor hedges, and they are even to 

 be seen in pretentious show places, where 

 one would expect people to know what a 

 real fence meant. 



Rich in native and other covert plants, 

 I have seen the privet recommended by 

 Sir Ralph Payne Galway as a covert 

 plant, for which it is useless beside the 

 beautiful covert plants we have — furze, 

 sloe, sweet briar, juniper, and wild briar 

 rose — and above all things recommended 

 as a covert plant near water, for which 

 Nature has given us the most fitting of 

 all in the spiry-leaved trees of the willow 

 and dog-wood order of which there are 

 many kinds. 



As to beauty, the wildest briars that 

 vex our legs and sometimes our faces, 

 have far more beauty, whether of leaf, 

 form, flower, or fruit. 



The land which has given us so many 

 beautiful trees and shrubs and flowers, 

 America,has nothing to do with the privets, 

 which are inhabitants of Asia and Europe, 

 including China and Japan. Some of 

 the species are evergreen, some summer 

 leafing, and others in our mild climate 

 hang between the two, and keep their 

 leaves except in very severe winters. 

 They are all too quickly propagated by 

 cuttings, and there are tropical species 

 not hardy in our country. 



The gain of the rapidity of growth of 

 the privet is more apparent than real, as 

 it simply leads to equally quick decay if 

 used as a fence plant or in any other way. 

 The true fence plants when fairly treated, 

 and put in the open in good condition as 

 all fence plants should be, are not by any 

 means slow growers. Holly in good soil 

 will grow two feet in a year. Quick is a 

 rapid grower after the first year or two ; 

 neither is the Yew by any means of slow 

 growth, but this is a plant which should 

 never be used for a fence where animals 

 could by chance come. 



L. coriaceiim. — A distinct and curious species 

 from Japan, evergreen, dwarf and bushy, from 

 2 to "5 ft. high with rhick leathery leaves, of 

 stiff habit, and flowers in white panicles with 

 the sickly odour of the tribe. It might have 

 some use among dwarf bushes on banks. 



L. Ibota. — A shrub from 5 to 8 ft. high or 

 more, of free habit and form, blooming freely 

 in summer. The white flowers in spikes 

 followed by dark berries. A native of China 

 and Japan. Syn. , L. amurense. 



L. japoniciini is a good evergreen kind, 

 rather dwarf and bushy, with pointed leaves 

 2 to 3 in. long, leathery, and of a deep green 

 with straggling panicles of flowers. Sy7i., L. 

 Sieholdi. 



L. huidum is one of the best for erect and 

 bold growth, growing 10 ft. high or more with 

 firm lustrous leaves, 5 to 6 in. long by over 

 2 in. wide, and bold panicles of flowers 6 in. 

 long in summer and autumn. It is a native of 

 China, where it forms a tree. A variety, L. 

 Alivoni, has longer leaves, and there is a 

 variegated variety. Syn.,L. sinense latifolimn. 



L. ovalifoliiim. — One of the most popular 

 varieties, and much used for forming hedges, as 

 it retains its foliage through the winter better 

 than the commoner privet, but it is without 

 much character as a shrub. There is a yellow 

 variegated variety which is also very popular, 

 but less showy as it gets old. 



L. Quihoni. — A Chinese privet of a wiry 

 dwarf character, with small leaves, and the 

 branches covered with a purple down ; flower- 

 ing freely and rather showily. 



