45 



they are thin, and are hardly more than somewhat thickened, 

 more persistent, ordinary annual roots. Thus the plant by its 

 several characteristics is intermediate between the Xiphium and 

 the Juno groups, being, on the whole, nearer to the latter ; if 

 we suppose that it has descended from some ancestor more or 

 less allied to /. Sisyrinchium, we may 

 imagine that it has wavered between 

 two lines of development, doubting 

 whether to become a Xiphium or a 

 Juno. 



The flower is not very large, about 

 the size of a small I. xiphium, and 

 its chief merit lies in the colouring, 

 though the form is not without grace. 

 While the falls and the styles are 

 yellow, a rich yellow in some speci- 

 mens, a more or less greenish yellow 

 in others, the turned-down standards 

 are of a full rich purple, and the con- 

 trast between these two hues produces 

 an effect which, though the plant bears 

 my name, I think I may say is very 

 pleasing. I have not as yet perceived 

 any fragrance. 



It does not take kindly to our Eng- 

 lish climate. The leaves often begin 

 to spear in late autumn, and suffer 

 from the buffetings of winter ; it 

 flowers in March, when its slender 

 stem is laid low by fierce winds, and, II 

 judged from the climate of its native" 



home, it needs, what it cannot get ,., 



FIG. 27. BULB OF IRIS FOSTERIANA. 

 with us, the rest of a thorough 



drought in summer. Not possessing the thick fleshy roots of 

 the other Ju?tos, it is less amenable to annual "lifting" than 

 are they; indeed my experience leads me to think that it 

 resents being moved at all. In fact, I find it a very difficult 

 plant to grow, and I doubt if it will ever become common in our 

 gardens. At home, in Gulran, it grows at an altitude of about 

 4,000 feet, in dry places, in what Dr. Aitchison calls " sandy 



