48 GARDENING WITH BRAINS '^ 



don't always get just what you ordered, even 

 from the best seedsmen, and yet you will not 

 be disappointed, so superlatively lovely are all 

 these flowers, on the improvement and varie- 

 gation of which the most flower-loving nation 

 in the world has spend many centuries. Unlike 

 the Japanese chrysanthemum, of which the 

 same may be said, the Japanese iris is perfectly 

 hardy. It will not bloom unless freely watered, 

 yet it does not flourish in soil which is habitually 

 boggy, though it loves to grow along brooks and 

 is therefore desirable for landscape gardening. 



"If the gladiolus were perfume giving," says 

 E. P. Powell, "it would be the ideal flower for 

 country cottages." It is so, anyway, I must 

 inconsistently confess. Some kinds of flowers 

 are showy at a distance, but offer no subtle 

 markings or tints for detailed admiration. Chry- 

 santhemums and asters are of this class ; so are 

 hollyhocks — of which you, nevertheless, ought 

 to have a row among your hardy perennials — 

 golden glow, and even peonies. But the glad- 

 ioli! As dazzling at a distance as salvias — the 

 cardinal birds among flowers — they are at the 

 same time as thrillingly varied in subtle tints 

 and stripes and blotches as pansies. Indeed, I 

 know a man who told me he was going to give 

 up pansies and devote himself exclusively to 

 gladioli. I forgave his foolishness because, 

 really, in face of the latest gladioli, with the 

 dazzling modem improvements, anyone might 



