54 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



to the double varieties. He had not seen any single flowered 

 hollyhocks attacked by it. 



Mr. Strong spoke of several evergreens, among them Kalmia 

 latifolia. He had nothing to say against the latter. It disap- 

 points many persons, because they do not treat it properly. It is 

 naturally a moisture and shade-loving plant, although after 

 becoming well established it will endure bright sunshine. 



Mr. Elliott said that although Kalmia latifolia usually grows 

 wild in the woods, the best growth and gi'eatest beauty of flowers 

 of this plant he ever saw was in a space of cleared forest where 

 it had grown up thickly, exposed to the fullest sunshine. He had 

 seen it in a garden, and also in nursery grounds where it was 

 growing better than it usually does when in a wild state. He had 

 found that, like the Rhododendron, the Kalmia likes plenty of 

 sunshine, but also like the Rhododendron it does best in a deep, 

 moist but well drained soil. 



Mr. Strong alluded to the fact that it grows on mountains, but 

 water often abounds there ; their being exposed to full sunshine 

 under such circumstances is a very different matter from taking 

 them out of their native soil, and replanting them not only in a 

 strange soil but in the full blaze of sunshine. 



O. B. Hadwen had taken many of these plants from the pas- 

 ture, and planted them in open ground in the autumn months 

 from September to November, and lost very few. But he always 

 takes up a ball of earth with each root he transplants. It does 

 not succeed as well in the shade of trees as in clear sunshine, but 

 flourishes best in the trenched ground of a Rhododendron planta- 

 tion. He esteems the Kalmia latijolia highly, and would like to 

 have it selected for the State Flower. No flower surpasses it for 

 a picture. He had been much interested in the paper read today, 

 and took no exceptions to it. But there was one omission he 

 would mention : the old-fashioned red Pseony, which is one of our 

 best hardy flowering plants. He has a bed of it, about ten feet 

 in diameter. They come up annually and produce a most brilliant 

 display, which affords much enjoyment to him. 



