My Garden in Spring 



at a surprising rate, being a great seeder, and also splitting 

 into many small offsets from the larger corms. It is appear- 

 ing in tufts all along the path edges of the rock garden, 

 the result of seeds getting swept in among the edging stones. 



C. versicolor is the last I shall insist upon your regard- 

 ing as a garden necessity, and if you cannot get hold of 

 the wild form from the Alpes Maritimes or the Riviera, 

 variable, delicately coloured, and feathered beauties of 

 endless kaleidoscopic possibilities, you should grow a 

 garden form known as var. picturatus, with white ground- 

 colour and crimson-purple featherings. Versicolor is the one 

 Crocus in which the inner segments are as a rule striped or 

 feathered on the inner surface. A few garden forms of vernus 

 and the wild one siculus are slightly so, but versicolor seems 

 to take a pride in internal decoration beyond all others. 



I cannot pass to another chapter without mentioning 

 C. Fleischeri, a starry little creature, but one that wears a 

 scarlet feather in the centre, the finely-divided stigmata of 

 course. They are so brightly coloured that they glow 

 through the white segments of the closed bud much as 

 the yolk of a woodpecker's egg does through the shell, 

 giving it a pink glow that, alas ! disappears as soon as it is 

 blown. Then too there is C. carpetanus, which is peculiar in 

 two respects ; it has a pale lilac stigma, but not so hand- 

 some or bright as that of the autumnal byzantinus, and 

 it also has a leaf that in section is semi-cylindrical, with 

 raised ribs on the under side, and no lateral blades as in 

 other Crocuses. It has a very pretty soft lilac flower, but 

 is not a robust grower. Underground even it is peculiar, 

 and wears a covering of fibres more like tow than the coat 

 of a respectable Crocus. 



94 



