My Garden in Spring 



I noticed it had failed to open its flower-bud, so I dug it 

 up to see what was wrong, and found some evil under- 

 ground grub (the Swift Moth, probably) had tunnelled right 

 through it. I much doubt whether it can possibly recover 

 after such an injury, and I shall have to rely upon one of 

 Mr. Allen's plicatus seedlings called Belated to keep up my 

 Snowdrop supply from October to April by filling up the last 

 fortnight after G. Ikariaehzs turned its attention to seedpods. 



The Spring Snowflake is so nearly a Snowdrop and 

 flowers with the later ones that I shall praise it here. 

 My favourite form is that known to science as Leucoium 

 vernunt, var. Vagneri, but which lies hidden in catalogues 

 and nurseries as carpathicum. Both are larger, more 

 robust forms than ordinary vernutn, and strong bulbs 

 give two flowers on each stem, but whereas carpathicum 

 has yellow spots on the tips of the segments, Vagneri has 

 inherited the family emeralds. It is an earlier flowering 

 form than vernum, and a delightful plant to grow in bold 

 clumps on the middle slopes of the flatter portions of the 

 rock garden. Plant it deeply and leave it alone, and learn 

 to recognise the shining narrow leaves of its babes, and to 

 respect them until your colony is too large for your own 

 pleasure, and you can give it away to please others. 



L. Hernandezii, also known as L. pulchellum, has won a 

 place in my affections by its useful preference for wet feet. 

 Like the larger and finer, but later L. aestivum, it thrives 

 well on the very edge of water, and looks so much better 

 there than anywhere else, that I advise such a planting. 

 Hernandezii flowers over a long period, throwing up a succes- 

 sion of flower-stems, and it comes in Daffodil days, at a time 

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