MERTENSIA. 
The clumped masses are only some 3 inches high, built of oval-pointed 
roughish grey leaves from which there arise in summer a number of 
fine 6-inch croziers that gradually uncurl large blossoms, golden-eyed, 
which range, according to age, through varying shades of pink and tur- 
quoise and sapphire to the most gorgeous velvety-violet, which is the 
prevailing note, being struck by the flowers about the third day after 
their opening. There is now news of a yet finer form of this lovely 
plant, M. p. chitralensis, with taller stature and larger bloom. And 
also we know of M. p. Tanneri, with leaves much narrower, and 
flowers of unvaried violet—all these being native to the highest Alps 
of the Western Himalaya, and in the garden of astonishing ease, 
readily to be multiplied by division or cuttings, and enjoying 
moraine. 
M. pulmonarioeides is the old and glorious M. virginica, with its 
ample metallic foliage of bronze and blue and grey and violet in early 
spring, followed by its generous tall and spraying heads of ample 
flowers in tones of clear china-blue and pink and lavender and tur- 
quoise, waving and shining on the spreading handsome stems of half 
a yard or more in height. No difficulty at all lies in wait for the 
Virginian Cowslip ; let but good root-stocks be obtained, not cut and 
split up for propagation beyond any hope of recuperation, but large 
and hearty ; let these then be planted in deep and very rich open soil, 
well drained, but in a sheltered position, where that lovely leafage 
shall take no hurt at the heartless hand of spring ; and then for many 
years to come the Mertensia will yield you, undisturbed, an ever- 
increasing harvest of pleasure in its flowers and leaves alike. 
M. racemosa is a weak high-alpine from India, almost hairless, and 
with feeble stems of some 3 to 8 inches at home. The basal leaves are 
stalked and very nearly round, and the stem-leaves too are almost 
all stalked. The flowers are borne in loose sprays, and are large and 
beautifully blue, the tube being twice the length of the calyx, and the 
face of the flower not far short of an inch across. 
M. rivularis is an inferior L. pilosa, with heart-lobed leaves and 
shorter calyx-lobes. 
M. serrulata, from Baikal, stands too close to M. sibirica to have 
any separate value. 
M. sibirica. See M. ciliata. 
M. simplicissima is simply M. maritima arisen from its bed of 
sand, and standing bolt upright without any branches. 
M. stylosa has leaves more definitely opposite each other than in 
M. longistyla, and the spike of blossom breaks into two divergent 
branches. 
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