2 PRESENT-DAY GARDENING 



in the Spanish peninsula and in Germany and Austria about 

 the middle of the sixteenth century. He published 

 accounts of the rarer plants that he found in these two 

 regions, and it is in his Spanish volume that we find 

 accounts of both the Spanish and the English Irises as we 

 now know them. One feature alone is sufficient to dis- 

 tinguish the two, and that both were known to Clusius is 

 proved by the fact that he notes that the one has larger seed- 

 vessels than the other so large, in fact, that the seeds rattle 

 in them when ripe. This exactly describes the capsule of 

 the English Iris. That of the Spanish varieties is much 

 narrower, so that the seeds have not room to rattle much 

 in it. 



From this we may infer that Linnaeus included under 

 the name of /. xiphium both the plants that are now 

 known as the English and Spanish Irises. 



But it is obvious that it would be impossible to give 

 here the result of similar inquiries and searches with regard 

 to all the other hundred and fifty odd species, that have 

 been found growing wild from California and Alaska in the 

 west to China and Japan in the east, and from Hong- Kong 

 in the south to Labrador in the north. 



It will be better to devote the space at our disposal to 

 the consideration of the Iris as a decorative and pleasure- 

 giving garden plant, which might be far more often 

 employed than at present seems to be the case for the 

 adornment of rock gardens, bog gardens, and herbaceous 

 borders. Few gardeners realise the possibilities of species 

 and varieties of Iris for one or other of these purposes. 

 Still less is it generally known and appreciated that, possibly 

 with the help of a cold frame or a few small portable lights, 



