in Opcn-Air Gardening in the Riviera. 345 



grow in the ordinarily prepared soil of the garden, and 

 which, we may presume, are not grown elsewhere in the 

 Kixdera, may now be seen to thrive remarkably well in such 

 conditions. 



Before we proceed to enumerate the plants so grown, we 

 would give actual measurements of some of the Sphagnum 

 beds, which may convey the clearest impression as to this 

 novel method of gardening. 



The extensive beds bordering the " pergola " walk are 

 rarely more than a foot and a half across, whilst the average 

 of extreme depths is little above four inches. This state- 

 ment as to the depth of the compost will, we expect, be 

 received with some surprise ; but when it is recognised that 

 the moss is merely heaped up upon flat slabs of cemented 

 stone or slate, and that the beds are in no sense troughs, 

 whilst the depth of moss slopes away to nothing towards 

 the edges, it will be seen that a breadth of a foot and a half 

 does not allow of any very considerable filling up in the 

 middle. 



Certainly about the roots of one or two of the more 

 vigorous plants, e.g., Plcroma and Hardenlergia, the compost 

 is heaped up so as to reach a maximum depth of a little 

 more than seven inches, but, as we have indicated, such a 

 depth is extremely exceptional. It is indicative of the slight 

 depth of moss that a small plant of Ardisia crenidata has 

 raised itself very visibly out of the bed by shoving with its 

 stout-growing roots against the slabs of slate upon which the 

 moss has been placed. 



In place of slates firmly cemented together, stones or 

 bricks may be used ; the prime object of their so solid con- 

 struction being to isolate the nutritious compost from the 

 ordinary soil in which are the greedy roots of the surround- 

 ing plants. In some situations, however, the moss is placed 

 upon a solid retaining-wall, behind which, though not quite 

 on a level with the Sphagnum bed, is a steeply sloping bed 

 of ordinary earth. In certain of the sunny or shadier angles 

 of the house pockets of moss are formed by means of larger 

 irregular stones placed directly upon an ordinary pavement. 

 In one of these pockets, where the compost is somewhat 

 deeper than usual, a magnificently luxuriant growth of 

 Hardcnbergia ovata is to be seen, which a few weeks ago 



