i6o THE ENGLISH FLOWER GARDEN. 



garden way of setting things out is very necessary in the garden, but 

 it will not do at all if we are to get the pictures we can get from 

 Narcissi in the turf, and it is always well to keep open turf here and 

 there among the groups, and in a lawn or a meadow we should leave 

 a large breadth quite free of flowers. 



SNOWDROPS NATURALISED. The illustration is from a photo- 

 graph taken by Mr. John McLeish at Straffan, Co. Kildare, and from 

 it one may gain a glimpse of the pretty and natural way in which 

 these flowers have grouped themselves on the greensward beneath the 

 red-twigged Limes and on the soft and mossy lawns. Originally no 

 doubt the Snowdrops were planted, but they have seeded themselves 

 so long that they are now thoroughly naturalised, and one of the 

 sights to see at Straffan Gardens is the Snowdrops at their best under 

 the leafless trees. The common single and double forms are still the 

 best for grouping in quantity and for naturalisation everywhere. 

 There are finer varieties, but none grow and increase so well in our 

 gardens as do these northern kinds. The best of the eastern Snow- 

 drops are very bold and beautiful, they are unsurpassed for vigour of 

 leafage and size of bloom if carefully cultivated, but they do not grow 

 and increase on the grass as do G. nivalis and all its forms. 



For solid green leafage and size and substance of flower, G. Ikariae 

 when well grown is, as I believe, the finest of all Snowdrops, but it is 

 from Asia Minor, and does not really love our soil and climate, nor is 

 it likely to naturalise itself with us as G. nivalis has done. The best 

 of all the really hardy and truly northern Snowdrops is a fine form of 

 G. nivalis, leaning to the broad-leaved or G. caucasicus group, which 

 was found in the Crimea in 1856 and introduced from the Tchernaya 

 valley to Straffan. It is called G. nivalis grandis, or the Straffan 

 Snowdrop, or G. caucasicus var. grandis, and to see it at its best is a 

 great pleasure. It is really a tall, vigorous-habited, and free-flowering 

 form of the wild Snowdrop (G. nivalis) as found in the Crimea. The 

 flowers are very large and pure in colour, and being borne on stalks a 

 foot or more in length they bunch better than do those of the common 

 type. G. plicatus is also from the Crimea, but is, as I have said, quite 

 different, having much broader plicate leaves and smaller flowers. 



Snowdrops generally like deep, moist soils and half shade, as their 

 flowers wither and brown quickly on dry, light soils in full sunshine. 

 In damp woods, copses, and hedgerows they seem most at home, and, 

 like Narcissi and many other early-flowering bulbs, they rather enjoy 

 flooding or occasional irrigation after root and top growth have begun. 

 At Straffan the lawn lies low down near the river Liffey, and it is 

 sometimes submerged for a day or two after the snow melts in early 

 spring or after heavy rains, From May until September, however, 

 the bulbs are dry among the tree roots with the dense canopy of Lime 



