1 6 Subtropical Gardening. 



The combinations of this kind that may be made 

 are innumerable, and there is no reason why our 

 beds should not be as graceful as bouquets well 

 and simply made. 



However, it is not only by making combinations 

 of the subtropical plants with the gay-flowering 

 ones now seen in our flower-gardens that a beau- 

 tiful effect may be obtained, but also with those 

 of a somewhat different type. Take, for instance, 

 the stately hollyhock, sometimes grown in such 

 formal plantations as to lose some of its charms, 

 and usually stiff and poor below the flowers. It is 

 easy to imagine how much better a group of these 

 would appear if seen surrounded by a graceful ring 

 of Cannas, or any other tall and vigorous subjects, 

 than they have ever yet appeared in our gardens. 



Consider, again, the Lilies, from the superb, tall, 

 and double varieties of the brilliant Tiger lily to the 

 fair White lily or the popular L. auratum. Why, 

 a few isolated heads of Fortune's Tiger lily, rising 

 like candelabra above a group of Cannas, would 

 form one of the most brilliant pictures ever seen in 

 a garden. Then, to descend from a very tall to a 

 very dwarf lily, the large and white trumpet-like 

 flowers of L. longiflorum would look superb, 

 emerging from the outer margin of a mass of sub- 



