OCTOBER 261 



LXIII 



The enterprise of the great nurserymen has provided 



such a vast variety of trees, shrubs, and herbs _ 



Messrs. 



for the adornment of our parks and gardens, veitch's 

 great and small, public and private, that there NoveltieB 

 is no excuse for the sameness which is visible in too 

 many pleasure-grounds. It requires a little knowledge 

 to discriminate in choice of plants, but that knowledge is 

 not difficult to acquire, and is very pleasant in the getting. 

 In the prevailing abundance, it is well to be resolute in 

 refusing to harbour anything but the very best species. 

 Messrs. James Veitch of Chelsea have probably done 

 more than any other firm in Britain during the last 

 hundred years to make us acquainted with the floral and 

 sylvan beauties of foreign lands. It should not be for- 

 gotten by Scotsmen that this family, whose name is a 

 household word in horticulture, are descended of an old 

 Border stock, the Veitches of Tweedside, and that the 

 name in its present form represents that of the Norman 

 De Vesci, once a powerful baron on the Border, and one 

 of the competitors for the crown of Scotland in 1298. 

 Three years ago Mr. Wilson and Dr. Henry, whom 

 Messrs. Veitch commissioned as plant collectors in China, 

 returned to this country laden with good things, and, it 

 must be added, others not so good. Among these were a 

 number of new groundsels of giant stature, whereof if your 

 gardening readers provide themselves with the fine orange 

 Senecio clivorum, they may rest assured that they have 

 the pick of the basket. The other new groundsels are 

 only fit for the wild garden. There is another of that 

 family, however, which has been longer in this country, 



