BUDS, BLOOM, AND EARLY BIRD 



Flowers 



Verbenas. — In the mid- Victorian epoch the Verbena 

 was one of the pets of professional florists, and it suffered 

 the common fate of being pampered and coddled, and 

 cross-fertilised and over-propagated until it became a 

 weakling, ever ready to fall a prey to a fungus — in this 

 case mildew. So it fell under a cloud. But, sweet and 

 pretty flower that it is, it was never forgotten, and it 

 is now having a little revival. If the reader decides 

 to indulge himself in a bed of mixed seedlings this year, 

 he is not at all likely to regret it. I advise him to sow 

 in a warm greenhouse early this month, set his plants out 

 three inches apart in boxes when they begin to crowd, 

 and harden them in a frame. There is an old species 

 of Verbena called Venosa with a very uncommon colour, 

 almost reminding one of mauve silk. I know of a bed 

 of it in a Suffolk garden where, toned by the shadows 

 of venerable Yews, it presents a refined and soothing con- 

 trast to the flames of Begonias and Zonal Geraniums. 

 And memory recalls a charming group of this Verbena 

 aud white Marguerites in a garden at Taormina. This 

 Verbena may be raised from seed. 



Hollyhocks. — There are people in the world who 

 never forget old flowers. It is not always that they are 

 old themselves ; they are often moved by an impulse 

 of inherited floricultural loyalty — of all examples of 

 fidelity the most precious. I know people who lament 

 that the golden day of the Hollyhock has passed, merely 

 from the recollection of the joy which their parents took 

 in it in the years gone by. This grand old flower is 

 never likely to regain the position which it once held 

 in our gardens, because the fungoid enemy (doubtless 

 67 



Feb. 

 1-14 



