MYOSOTIS. 
made up its mind what colour to be, so compromises on a velvety ring of 
blue, outside another of blurred white, the whole effect being strangely 
muddle-headed and indeterminate, by no means redeeming the plump 
little flowers from their look of stolidity, as well as meanness, in 
the midst of the tropical leafage from which their congregations feebly 
peer. It is a tender thing, too, and has to be cosseted with sand and 
seaweed. In other parts of England it will usually have to be taken 
indoors and cherished through the winter. In Cornwall you grow it 
in solid rows under the wall of the kitchen garden, like artichokes. 
You then measure the flowers with a piece of cotton and compare 
them with your neighbour’s. And if his are larger, you throw away 
Myosotidium, and concentrate on Embothrium or any other exotic to 
which some quirk of climate, soil, or situation forbids him to aspire 
so successfully. At least, so say the envious and wicked. 
Myosdtis.—The distribution of this family seems even odder 
than that of Gentian. For while overflowing freely into the Antarctic 
Alps, the Forget-me-nots do not seem to effect any lodgment in 
America; and even as Gentianes, in their New Zealand range have odd 
fantasies of colour. No Himalayan Gentian, forinstance,isanything but 
blue; no New Zealander is ever blue at all (and never anything but 
white or pink). Similarly with Myosotis ; no New Zealand Mouse-ear 
is ever anything but white or yellow. The race is a large one, prolific 
of annuals and worthlessnesses. Of such the following list shall take no 
note ; the remaining kinds at their choicest only ask for light open 
places (or moraine) on the rock-work ; and are of every degree in beauty, 
flowering in summer, and easily to be multiplied either by division or 
seed. The New Zealanders especially have long been clamouring 
for a fair trial. Some of the species have been lately set apart as a 
new race under the name of Hxzarrhena, but it seems more convenient 
from every point of view here to retain them all under the good old 
name of Myosotis. And see Appendix. 
M. albo-sericea is about 6 inches high or less, clothed in bright silver- 
silk, with one or more naked flower-stems, expanding large ample 
stars of bright sulphur-yellow. It is very rare, unfortunately, in the 
South Island, above Otago. 
M. alpestris has by now yielded so many varieties that its name 
is almost swamped. Such can always be found in catalogues, and the 
best of all is a most curious form or hybrid by the name of Ruth Fischer, 
tight and dwarf in growth, with specially large fat leafage, strangely 
crimped and curled upon itself; and then, in the second year, its full 
display of enormous soft-azure flowers on quite short and branching 
stems. Only by the utmost botanical niceties, if at all, can M. pyren- 
501 
