BORDER IRISES 167 



flexed leaves are slightly glaucous; the flower stalk, 

 about eighteen inches high, bears several very large, 

 flat blue-purple flowers curiously clouded with a deeper 

 colour and further embellished by an ivory crest. There 

 is a rare white variety which is surpassed in elegance 

 and distinction by few flowers known to me. Though 

 tectorum is often spoken of as not very amenable, it 

 grows here with great freedom in a slightly raised sunny 

 border protected on the north and east by the garden 

 wall, and bears its esthetic flowers in satisfying pro- 

 fusion. I have raised many plants of tectorum from 

 seed gathered from my own plants many of which have 

 bloomed the second year. 



Wee Iris cristata, a native American found in parts of 

 Maryland and Virginia, has the appearance of some- 

 thing rare and costly, but grows like any weed in the 

 borders and makes a charming edging. The plants 

 grow only about four inches high, and the large spreading 

 lavender blossoms made brilliant by a conspicuous gold 

 crest are so profusely borne as to quite hide the foliage. 

 They flower in May, and I like to plant them in front of 

 the orange-scarlet Geums or between mounds of deep- 

 purple Aubrietia. 



Many delightful plants are to be found in the Apogon 

 or Beardless section of the rhizomatous Irises, and most 

 of these, while as easy to grow and as showy as the 

 German Irises, are, save for the Japanese sort, rare in 

 gardens. Perhaps this is because they are looked upon 



