LANDSCAPE 

 ARCH, j 

 LIBRARY 



PREFACE 



THE gardening world has recognised for some time past 

 that in the realm of Iris the mantle of the late Sir Michael 

 Foster descended upon the writer of this book and it will 

 confirm the succession. It is a good book written with 

 all the verve and freedom of accurate knowledge derived 

 from observation of the plants as they grow as well as from 

 study of their dried bones in collectors' herbaria an essen- 

 tial combination for the elaboration of any sketch that is to 

 suggest claim to authority in such plants, and this book does 

 suggest and makes good its claim in this respect. 



Not the most ardent enthusiast can pretend that Iris- 

 culture attracts in our days with the intensity which the 

 intrinsic merit of the species should command, and in some 

 degree this lukewarmness may be ascribed to difficulties over 

 which no help has been obtainable from any concise but 

 not technical exposition of their forms and needs. The 

 facile rhizome with potential immortality of the Bearded 

 Iris has given it a dominance in cultivation through which 

 it has become an obsession as the type of Iris, and it must 

 always have a prominent place in estimation, but the growth- 

 forms of members of other groups Juno, for example 

 modify in no small measure the stereotyped concept of what 

 is an Iris, and the daintiness, softer blendings, less demon- 

 strativeness of many of them ask for them a share of atten- 



vU 



I. 069 



