ANEMONE. 
the Mont Cenis, again, Alpina itself varies, and in a waving drift of 
snow there will be seen creamy flowers, and pale-yellow flowers, and 
here and there a citron-coloured beauty only by the minutest eye of 
doubt to be distinguished from A. a. sulfurea. In the Alps of the far 
South, in Piedmont and Lombardy, A. alpina itself becomes so small 
and mean as hardly to be known ; it is already growing inferior in the 
copse-edges of the Cottians, while on the Grigna or the. Forcella 
Lungieres it is such a single-stalked puny little 5-inch affair that one 
often takes it at first or second sight for something quite distinct. 
So protean is the species, in fact, that botanists have recognised the 
impossibility of naming fixed varieties ; the only one, after Sulfurea, 
that has any existence in catalogues is A. a. Burseriana, which is a 
secondary name for A. a. myrrhidifolia, a form differing from the 
type in being of rather smaller habit, and in having leaves so much 
more deeply, finely, and closely cut that they do indeed resemble 
those of some small Sweet Cicely. Yet another in the same kind is 
A.a. millefoliata, while the minutest development is A. a. alpicola. It 
only remains to be added that A. alpina sometimes has flowers of 
different sexes—one possessing only a golden tassel of anthers, and 
its neighbour only a naked greenish bunch of carpels. 
All these Anemones have huge wooden roots of a length, stoutness, 
and toughness that makes them perfectly impregnable except by a 
pickaxe or mattock. At the same time, the difficulty of collecting 
living specimens has been greatly exaggerated ; for, if some 6 inches 
or more of the woody stock be broken and torn away, it will readily 
emit new fibres if sent home and carefully treated in the sand-bed. 
However, of course the plant’s development is thus retarded, and 
this method is only recommended in the case of very special varieties, 
such as a most beautiful windmill-whirling double form from the 
Mont Cenis, which flowered happily and in full character the second 
season in England, and now is a large thriving clump. In general 
it is best to collect fresh seed in autumn, and sow it as soon as possible 
in good rich cool loam, perhaps with a dash of peat ; if snow can be 
induced to lie on the bed or pan, so much the better for the seed, 
whose germination will thus be mysteriously accelerated. But in 
any case the seedlings should appear profusely in spring, and after a 
season’s growth the young plants may be put out in the place where 
they are to remain—some very deep well-drained bed of light rich 
soil, perfectly open to sun and air. Here they should flower the 
next year, and in another summer or two have formed big crowns, 
which will then increase in size and splendour for ever and for 
ever without further attention, till one big bush will show as many 
63 
