ASTRAGALUS. 
select of rock-works. For this is a neat tuft of glossy dark leaves 
like long pointed shields with toothed edges, but quite undivided 
and unfeathered as are the leaves of the rest. Up above these in 
summer come shooting gracious airy 8-inch plumes of white blossom, 
sometimes so copiously produced indeed that the clump gives the only 
trouble it ever occasions cultivators by blooming itself into its grave. 
However, it can easily be raised from seed, though it shares the general 
weakness of Astilbe as regards the inviolability of the family taboo, 
and clearly interbreeds ; for, among my seedlings here, one of the best 
plants has feathered fee, and altogether Bee a very minute 
form of A. sinensis. 
A. Tacquetii, again, now on the Austrian horizon of our hopes, will 
prove a rock-garden treasure of the first rank. For this is yet another 
dwarf—a 6-inch version of A. sinensis, but with drooping plumes. It 
will prosper and emit runners in any cool choice place, and its force of 
character is guaranteed by the fact that it comes from Korea. 
Astragalus is a name that breaks the rock-gardener’s heart. 
There are many large families of Pea-flowers, but Astragalus beats 
them nearly all; a race of vast distribution alike in the Old World and 
in the New, frequenting, as a rule, deserts and dry terrible places, 
where it often develops into masses of thorns ; but, on the other hand, 
descending into lush fields and woods and there waxing fat, and ascend- 
ing high also into the warmer mountain chains, and offering the rock- 
garden a large choice. Yet the choice is hard to make ; there are some 
thousand-odd species of Astragalus in the world, and the fact that 
there are only half a dozen of them or so (if that) in general cultivation 
sheds a lurid light on the unattractiveness of the race. In point of 
fact, dense over Astragalus lies that curse of the family’s ineffectual- 
ness (outside yellows). Their colour so often lacks just the touch that 
gives value and brilliancy ; they are, not to put too fine a point upon 
it, for the large part a cousinhood of forbidding weeds, often difficult 
and nearly always worthless. Here and there, however, we know of 
deserving species; and this fact has caused me with a jealous and 
unwearied eye to sift the enormous lists of Astragali that come in from 
almost every country, to see whether here and there, through the 
mists of a Latin diagnosis, it may prove possible to discern a promise 
of prettiness. So much being ascertained, it only remains to get seed 
of the Astragalus in question ; it will germinate readily, and beyond all 
reasonable doubt will thrive in some sunny place in very light and 
stony soil—stony almost to the pitch of being moraine, but rather on 
the hard side, so long as it be hot and perfectly drained. (No Astragalus 
should ever be lifted, moved, divided, or otherwise propagated than by 
134 
