THE WELL-CONSIDERED GARDEN 



a bargain. Thousands for a few dollars, hundreds 

 for some cents. Next in cheapness to seeds they 

 are; and have a habit, when not bothered by a 

 nervous or too transplanting owner, of multiply- 

 ing in a fashion comforting to see. In the nine 

 years in which I have been growing the crocus on 

 our small piece of ground, I cannot now remember 

 having lost any except in cases where the growth 

 of overhanging or overhungry shrubbery has eaten 

 up the little things at its feet. 



One of my first plantings before the bare east 

 wall of brick of a then new house was of the cro- 

 cus Reine Blanche, a fine white, in groups now 

 dense, now more open, with hosts of Scilla Sibi- 

 rica crowding among them, and that first glory of 

 the tulip family, Kaufmanniana, holding outspread 

 back of and above the little blue-and-white multi- 

 tude its lilylike flowers flowers which only open 

 to the sun. Tulipa Kaufmanniana is costly, I 

 admit, and growing more so, but, as in the case 

 of Darwin and May-flowering tulips, many of 

 which are rapidly increasing in value, delays are 

 dangerous. Therefore, buy now if possible. I 

 must have often described it before its general 

 color within the flower a rich cream, running into 

 clear yellow toward the centre of the bloom; on 

 94 



