CHAPTER XI 



FLOWERING SHRUBS 



IN considering suitable plants for the unheated greenhouse, 

 it is better partly for the sake of easy reference and partly 

 because their cultural treatment is, in most cases, likely to 

 run on the same lines to group them under specific headings. 

 Flowering shrubs, both hardy and half-hardy, form a most 

 important decorative class, whether from the standpoint of the 

 spacious winter garden, or of the modest conservatory for 

 which plants in 5 -in. to lo-in. pots are the most suitable 

 and convenient. The winter garden is pre-eminently fitted 

 for the permanent planting of some of the countless grand 

 shrubs and rafter plants, such as the Himalayan Rhodo- 

 dendrons, Acacias, Magnolias, and others, which flower 

 naturally during the earliest part of the year, for it is likely 

 enough to stand idle, as far as show purposes are concerned, 

 during the summer months not for lack of material to make 

 it delightful, but for lack of interest at that season on the 

 part of the owners of it. For late autumn, a season when the 

 winter garden begins once more to be attractive to the house 

 party, such fine things as the deep-purple-flowered Desmodium 

 penduliflorum and Asparagus umbellatus, which is charming 

 in flower as well as graceful in greenery, may be cited as 

 examples less familiar than they might be. 



The glass corridor, being often a passage-way from the 

 house to a billiard-room or to the gardens, might give suitable 

 place to such mid-season subjects as, for example, Carpenteria 



