The Culmination of Spring 



plants are liable to be killed in severe winters more easily 

 than youngsters. 



Another unusual plant growing close by is Bunium 

 rotundifolium, very much like Thaspium aureum but peren- 

 nial instead of biennial like the latter. Both have charm- 

 ingly glossy leaves of the Parsnip persuasion but not so 

 coarse as the real members of that sect, and when old 

 enough to flower they send up foot-high stems with brilliant 

 yellow bracts surrounding the umbels of greenish-yellow 

 flowers, and are wonderfully bright and suggestive of some 

 very good Euphorbia. Both will grow happily in shady, 

 poor ground, and furnish it in the best taste, as advertise- 

 ments put it. 



Parallel with the Vine Pergola and nearer the River 

 the next paved walk has a row of Eucalypts on either side. 

 I have tried for years to get a short avenue of them here, 

 but some grow lanky and blow over, some are too tender 

 for the winters, and others grow into rounded bushes, so 

 that at present they are all heights from four to fifteen 

 feet. E. cocci/era, E. urnigera, and E. obliqua promise to 

 make the best job of it at present. Tufted Pansies, such as 

 Archie Grant and Maggie Mott, line the edges of this path, 

 and the bed alongside the corresponding walk in the Rose 

 Garden opposite is planted under the Roses with white and 

 yellow Pansies gradually shading through pale yellow 

 sorts edged with lilac, such as Skylark and Duchess of 

 Fife, to the lavender Kitty Bell and then to deeper violet 

 varieties. The white and yellow ones have a charming effect 

 planted in blocks of varying sizes. Royal Sovereign, Maggie 

 Clunas, Bullion, and Primrose Dame are good yellows, and 

 2 93 



