8 IN A GLOUCESTERSHIRE GARDEN 



and which keep their beauty all through the winter 

 and spring. But for January we have the cyclamen 

 of the south and east of Europe (C. coum\ which 

 produces abundance of flowers, not so large as the 

 autumnal species, but of a rich red (sometimes white) 

 colour, and so freely producing plants from self-sown 

 seeds, that I am sure I am not exaggerating when I 

 say that I have hundreds of plants, many of them 

 growing far away from the parent plants. I suppose 

 they like the soil here, and though they are mostly 

 wood plants I grow them under a south wall, as I do 

 most plants that flower early in the year, for I think 

 such early visitors deserve all the help and shelter we 

 can give them. I wonder that those who have woods 

 do not try to naturalise the cyclamen, but I never 

 heard of its being so used ; yet that it could be 

 naturalised is certain, from the fact that it has found 

 its way into English and other floras. But it is quite 

 a southern plant, and is not found wild north of 

 Switzerland, and there the native species (C. europceum) 

 is a summer bloomer, very pretty, but not equal to 

 C. coum, and not so easily grown, yet it grows on 

 some parts of the Alps up to 1500 feet, and I have 

 it from the Rhone Glacier. I suppose the cyclamen 

 is an old inhabitant of English gardens, for Gerard 

 named some places in which it was to be found wild, 



