136 IN A GLOUCESTERSHIRE GARDEN 



and evergreen ferns, yet there are still some good 

 flowers to be gathered besides those I have already 

 named. The Clematis cirrhosa will not flower every year, 

 though I have often had it in good flower in December, 

 but as it comes from Western France and the south of 

 Spain, it requires more heat than our summers usually 

 give it; when we have a hot summer and a mild 

 November and December, then it will produce abun- 

 dance of its pale buff flowers. But in almost every 

 season I can pick flowers in December from the white 

 variety of the dwarf heath of Southern Europe all 

 through the winter. 



I must say a few words about the laurustinus, which 

 I mentioned last month, partly because it may almost 

 be called the flowering shrub of December, but also 

 because I overlooked some notes I had made on its 

 literary history, which has one or two curious points. 

 There can be little doubt that our plant is the tinus of 

 Ovid, Baccis coerula tinus, and the tinus of Pliny, * which 

 differeth from all other laurels in the colour of the fruit, 

 for it beareth blue berries,' and it is possible that the 

 Latin word may be derived from the Doric TWJ/OS 

 (small) ; but when we are further told by Miller (and 

 others) that the word means the small laurel, and that 

 the Doric word is the origin of our word ' tiny,' we may 

 be allowed to doubt, for ' tiny ' was an English word 



