MARCH 9 



common things, and a close study of the growers' 

 catalogues led me to indulge plentifully in the 

 ostrowskia magnified, the romneya coulteri, the iris 

 laevigata, the crinum longifolium, the meconopsis 

 wallichii, and other glorious and important-sounding 

 subjects. When summer came the ostrowskias ap- 

 peared indeed, but only to demonstrate that they 

 found their position untenable, and had not the 

 slightest intention of thriving in it ; the romneyas 

 languished early and quite unreasonably for want 

 of water, and when supplied with it disappeared 

 altogether; the irises and the Himalayan poppies 

 never came up at all, because the soil was too dry 

 for them, and the crinums, though they have 

 flourished ever since, have never shown the slightest 

 inclination to flower. 



And it was much the same in the greenhouse. 

 There were artillery plants which never found heat 

 enough to make them explode ; amaryllids that 

 stood up bravely in their greenery, but refrained, 

 from weakening themselves by flower production ; 

 yellow callas that did not bloom when blooms were 

 wanted. For the most terrible part of the business 

 was this, that all through the winter, when blossoms 

 would have been valuable, there were none to be 

 found in my greenhouse. They reserved them- 

 selves for a summer show, and flowered gaily when 

 at last for eventually I had to come down to 

 common border plants the outdoor garden was 

 able to supply all I wanted. 



One year's experience of this sort of thing made 

 me realise that by some means or another "there 

 must be an holteration somewhere," as the gardener, 



