244 THE ALP1NE FLORA 



masses of Bamboos (here Lord Redesdale's collection is 

 complete), luxuriate on all sides in the generous and kindly 

 soil. There is a Japanese garden, filled with priceless 

 treasures from the empire of the East, where the Earl at 

 one time was ambassador, and over all a great bronze 

 statue of Buddha watches, calm and strong, as guardian 

 spirit over all. Elsewhere there are undergrowths of 

 Ferns and Himalayan Paeonies, banks of perennial plants 

 and miscellaneous Heaths, glorious Magnolias, with 

 flowers most wonderfully contrasted against the sombre 

 green of American or Chinese pines. 



Here and there, each according to his necessities, are 

 placed the modest representatives of our alpine flora. Yet 

 the owner has his grievance ; he sighed, when he showed 

 me round this wonderland, over Gentiana verna ; it was 

 not for him. Can one, in this world, ever at once have all 

 things? There must, it would seem, be impossibilities in 

 the path of even the all-successful. 



But I must leave half the marvels and glorious sights 

 untold. Over all stand the picturesque outlines of the old 

 Scotch firs, as if to seal the heterogeneous, heteromor- 

 phous assembly with the stamp of its British home. 



1 have described elsewhere 1 the splendid gardens at 

 Warley Place. In them a true artist displays her accurate 

 and deep knowledge of plants 1 except none united to 

 astonishing experience of practical gardening. Miss Wil- 

 mott is unquestionably the amateur, who in England 

 (and consequently in all the world) has the best know- 

 ledge of bulbs and hardy plants. She has inherited the 

 traditions of the Rev. Wolley Dod and Sir Michael Fos- 

 ter, whose unique collection of Iris and bulbs, the most 

 beautiful and complete in existence, was given to her by 

 the owner. The cause of gardening claims all her ability, 



* "Les pi antes aJpines et de rocailles, pp. 46-9. 



