AQUATIC PLANTS, HARDY FERNS, ETC. 255 



4 to 6 feet across and the flowers a foot in diameter. Very 

 few persons succeed in blooming this royal flower, and then 

 it is done only where artificial heat is introduced from some 

 greenhouse or other steam or hot-water plant near by. But 

 where such facilities are available the results generally well 

 repay the effort, for nothing of an aquatic growth can 

 exceed the grandeur of the immense floating leaves and 

 large gorgeously colored flowers of this plant. 



Many other water-loving plants besides the water-lilies 

 may be used with good effect in aquatic gardens. These 

 may be divided into those growing directly in deep water 

 and those growing in the moist soil on its borders. Of the 

 first are the 



WATER-HYACINTH (Eichhornia crassipes). The flowers 

 of this plant resemble those of the common light blue 



FIG. 150. WATER-POPPY (Lymnocharis Humboldtii) 



hyacinth, and by some it is likened to a species of orchid- 

 blossoms. It grows freely in shallow warm water, each 

 plant, after separating from its parent, floating, driven about 



