ALPINE FLOWERS 245 



beautiful new American character. I am confident of it for two 

 reasons. We have the spirit and we have the plants. We all 

 want the best there is, and certainly there are no flowers more 

 beautiful than alpines. 



England herself used to be equally pessimistic about her own 

 ability to grow alpines, and her wonderful enthusiasm of to-day has 

 come within the memory of the present generation. English 

 authorities used to say that alpine flowers cannot be grown in the 

 lowlands. Certainly the climate of England is quite unlike that 

 of the Alps. In Switzerland the flowers are protected from alter- 

 nate freezing and thawing by the snow; in England they are not. 

 Yet there are few alpine flowers worth having that are not now 

 grown in England. 



We, too, are handicapped by changeable winters and hot 

 summers, but we can find plenty of charming alpines that will 

 stand both. For instance, here are some flowers that grow wild 

 on the Alps but are so common in gardens that we never think of 

 them as alpine plants the snowdrop, daffodil, poet's narcissus, 

 trailing myrtle, Christmas rose, lily-of-the-valley, Scotch pinks, 

 common columbine, and English daisy. You may think that these 

 are too gardenesque for alpine effects, and I heartily agree that im- 

 proved pinks, columbines, and daisies would not be appropriate. 

 It would be impure design to use big masses of them on rocks. But 

 the wild forms of these plants are as dainty as any other alpine 

 flowers, and it is easy to get the seed of any wild forms from 

 Geneva, Switzerland. 



This reminds me that the cheapest and easiest way to 

 start a collection of alpine flowers is to import the seed from 

 Europe, because flower seeds can now be mailed with slight duty. 

 There are no American catalogues of alpine plants, but there are 



