English Iris. 



CHAPTER VI. 



THE RESERVE AND CUT-FLOWER GARDENS. 



NOTHING is worse in gardening than the way in which plants of 

 all kinds are huddled together without regard to fitness for associa- 

 tion in stature, in time of blooming, or in needs of culture. The 

 common scene of confusion is the shrubbery border, into which 

 Carnations, annuals, Alpine flowers, and rampant herbs are often thrown, 

 to dwindle and perish. There is no shrubbery border that could not 

 be made beautiful by carpeting it with wood and copse plants of 

 the northern world in broad groups, but many of our favourite flowers 

 are not wood plants, and many for example, Carnations cannot 

 maintain the struggle against the bushes and trees. Hardy plants 

 should be divided into two broad series at leastthose which thrive in 

 and near woody growth, and those which must perish there, Solomon's 

 Seal and the blue Apennine Anemone are types of plants that one 

 may grow in any shady place : Carnation, Pink, Auricula are among 

 the flowers which must have good soil and be kept away from tree 

 roots, and though good borders, away from shrubby growth, grow 

 many plants well, a further division of the work will be found wise in 

 many places. 



One good plan that all can follow is the growing of certain 

 plants without heed to their place in any design, but not in any kind 

 of " mixed border " or in other mixed arrangements. Many hardy 

 flowers are worthy of special culture, and good results cannot often be 

 got without it, whether we grow Carnations, Pinks, Pansies, Phloxes, 

 Lilies, Stocks, double Wallflowers, Cloves, or scarlet Lobelias. Even a 

 choice annual, such as Rhodanthe, or a beautiful Grass, it is not .easy to 

 succeed with unless it has a fair chance, away from the crowding of 



