208 MY GARDEN 



nurseryman, and they are much more difficult to estab- 

 lish. Sometimes with considerable care they die in the 

 summer after they are planted. In other cases they are 

 so slow in becoming established that they make little 

 growth for two or three years, and when they readily 

 take to their new quarters, it is not unusual for them to 

 be overtaken by plants several years younger at the 

 time of planting." Mr. Gordon recommends plants 

 offered at "the usual catalogue prices" as best for 

 general purposes. Perhaps the most appreciated shrubs 

 are those which come in the early year before the snow 

 feeling has quite vanished from the air, and those are 

 important, too, in the effect of the garden, for with only 

 bulbs and creeping things, such as mainly decorate the 

 spring, the shrubs and flowering trees are needed to 

 carry our colour higher up. 



The first to bloom behind our garden walls in a 

 sheltered south border is the Mezereon (Daphne mez- 

 ereum), which before a leaf is thought of, often in late 

 February, has wrapped its stiff little branches in a fra- 

 grant purple scarf or somewhat less effectively in a 

 white one. It is a dwarf and succeeds best in a light, 

 well-drained soil made rich with old cow manure, and it 

 will grow in partial shade. The first mild days cause 

 the tiny crowded blossoms to open, and often in Novem- 

 ber there will be another less hearty but very welcome 

 flowering. 



Another very early comer is the Twin-flowered Honey- 



