260 OUR ROCK-GAEDEN 



Thames that filled them at high water a noble 

 hunting ground for all kinds of water plants, but now, 

 alas ! drained, intersected by formal gravel paths, 

 provided with bandstand, refreshment-rooms and 

 all the adjuncts that go to form a park of the most 

 conventional type. The marsh orchis approaches 

 the common spotted orchis that is so abundant in 

 the Spring in pastures and open woods, and 

 some botanists will tell us that it is but a variety 

 of it. However that may be, we may well include 

 both in our collection. 



The wild tulip the other flower on Plate 

 XXXVI. represents rather an aspiration of ours 

 than a realisation. It has been sent to us, but 

 somehow failed to respond to our attempts to 

 make it welcome. It is common enough in some 

 parts of the Continent in pastures and on waste 

 ground, and is perhaps truly as indigenous in some 

 of our English counties. It would be an interest- 

 ing plant to add to one's store. 



We have in Britain some four species of mallow, 

 but only one of these will repay cultivation, the 

 musk mallow Malva moschata a plant that is by 

 no means difficult to grow. It is a perennial, and 

 will, therefore, when once established give us no 

 more anxiety. The plant is some one to two feet 

 high, throwing up a cluster of almost erect stems. 

 These bear richly-cut leaves, and at their summits 

 numerous large rose-coloured flowers, or it may 



