HARDY HERBACEOUS FLOWERS. 291 



Califomicum. — A very robust variety, attaining a height of 

 from two to three feet, and blooming in September. The 

 flowers are pale blue, veined with purple. 



Japonica. — The flowers are deep blue. It grows about 

 eighteen inches high, and blossoms in August. 



Na]pellus. — Flowers in J\me, which are a light azure, tipped 

 with yellow. Grows eighteen inches. 



Oriental. — ^About eighteen inches in height, flowers light 

 cream-colored, tipped with yellow, appearing in July. 



Versicolor. — Flowers blue and white, appearing in July and 

 August, stalks eighteen inches. 



Aquilegia. — The Columbine. — This is an old and favorite 

 flower, flourishing in any garden, perfectly hardy, and multiplied 

 into an indefinite number of varieties, bearing single and double 

 flowers of every shade of blue, purple, black, rose-color, red, 

 reddish-brown, striped and variegated. They blossom in June 

 and July, require no special culture, and are propagated from 

 seed and by dividing the roots. 



Campanula. — The Bdl-flower. — There are a number of pretty 

 flowers that belong to this group, some of them perennials, and 

 others lasting only for two years. The Canterbury BeUs belong 

 to the biennials, being raised from seed sown in the spring, trans- 

 planted in August or September to the place where they are to 

 remain, and flowering the following summer. As the plants die 

 after ripening the seed, a continuous supply of these flowering- 

 plants can be had only by sowing seed every year. 



Some of the Campanulas are of very slender, graceful habit, 

 such as the C. Rotundifolia, often known as the Harebell. It is 

 of this pretty, deHcate plant that Sir Walter Scott is speaking, 

 when he describes the step of the fair Lady of the Lake as being 

 so light that 



" E'en the slight Harebell raised its head 

 Elastic from her airy tread." 



Others again are more robust, growing from four to five feet high, 

 and often used, especially by our Anglican forefathers, to deco- 



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