244 ANNUAL REPORT 



in the Campanula and Canterbury bell and Clematis, or a finer 

 purple than that of the dahlia? What magnificence and variety of 

 coloring can be found elsewhere than in the gladioli or dahlia? 

 What flower is equal in magnificence to the Lilium auratum or 

 Japan Jily, or what more graceful and delicate than the lily of the 

 valley? Let us have annuals, but let us not forget the biennials 

 and more hardy plants— remembering that they give a variety and 

 picturesquesness to the garden or lawn which no annuals can. And 

 the bienni :1s and perennials are so permanent, — so easily increased 

 by division of the roots and by seeds, so easily moved and trans- 

 planted, and without the cost of buying each year a new set of 

 plants. 



But of the hollyhock — the plant which we can still see with the 

 eye of memory standing in stately vigor in the gardens, cultivated 

 by hands long since passed away — the old-fashioned hollyhock 

 with its large single flowers which stood above our heads while 

 children, in far away gardens, what shall we say of it? True, it 

 is old-fashioned, but as I recall my last year's garden with its fifty 

 or sixty stately hollyhock plants, running through all the shades 

 of red, crimson, rose, buff yellow, salmon, white, purple, maroon 

 and almost to a black, and the beautifully fringed and variegated 

 Japanese varieties, I remember that a bed of dazzling Sam Sloan 

 geraniums and two or three beds of choice asters, Victorias or 

 Truffaults peony, wo aid scarce occasion a glance from the passer 

 by, but those hollyhocks, standing from four to seven feet high, 

 would attract the attention of all, and cause many a backward 

 glance and lingering step, and excite many an exclamation of de- 

 light, and many a request for a single flower or for seeds later on. 

 And so 1 affirm that if you raise flowers to brighten your gardens, 

 or to brighten the faces of those who pass by, no flower excels the 

 hollyhock. You can prune it and keep it low and bushy, or con- 

 fine it to a single stately stalk, or mass it and make a dense clump 

 of beauty. You can raise, if you wish, the old single variety, to 

 remind you of the garden, in the home of years ago, cultivated by 

 fathers and mothers who have long since laid aside the trowel, or 

 you can fringe the edges of the old-fashioned flower and variegate 

 its center with different colors and thereby have the Japanese 

 varieties, or you can have the semi- double, or you can have the 

 complete double flower — as large as the doubled up fist. The same 

 hybridizing skill as has developed the chrysanthemum, the 

 gladioli, the dahlia and other plants, has also developed the holly- 

 hock ; it has ceased to be an old-fashioned flower and has, in 

 reality, become a modern flower. Within a few years it has 

 become a popular summer flowering plant, and when planted in a 

 rich soil and sunny position it is a very impressive and stately 

 plant. 1 know of no plant whose flowers so perfectly combine 

 large size and delicacy and variety of coloring as the hollyhock. 

 Its flowers, when well cultivated, are fully as double and almost 

 as pure and perfect as the camellia. It has ceased to be coarse — 

 the pure white is beautiful ; the delicate rose and pure yellow are 

 very handsome ; the shade which almost reaches a black is found 



