138 A Little Maryland Garden 
I am now interested in some new plants 
in the lower border. I have often seen them 
praised in the catalogues, particularly in 
a small pamphlet on hardy plants, from New 
Jersey, that has always seemed to me very 
sensible and reliable. The ones now bloom- 
ing are two varieties of the Chinese bell- 
flower (Platycodon Leichtlinit) and Stokes’s 
aster (Stokesia cyanea). The plants are in 
good condition, and full of buds, promising 
a long bloom. The Stokesia has rather an 
aster-like flower, much fringed and single, of 
a rather light violet colour, spreading wide and 
flat, and very decorative. The bell-flowers 
are really beautiful, oddly shaped, and the 
one a deep violet blue, the other greyish 
white. The other flowers that came with 
them are some Michaelmas daisies, cardinal 
flowers, Campanula persicifolia, and a Shasta 
daisy which already, little plant as it is, is 
topped with large white flowers. 
July is not the time one would choose for 
transplanting, but I have often done it then, 
and this year circumstances made it most 
