PART I.] CULTURAL 49 



A rocky path leads one up and down, now closed in overhead 

 by Hawthorns embowered in Honeysuckle, Vine, and now open 

 and clear, and as you pick your way over matted tree-roots or past 

 slippery rocks, the acres of Azaleas and Rhododendrons flash out in 

 the evening sunshine, each cluster glowing like jewelled lamps full of 

 coloured light. They are mostly garden kinds or hybrids, but there 

 are noble plants of the Himalayan R. Thomsonianum, R. Falconeri, 

 and R. Edgworthii amongst them. The colours vary from white and 

 soft lilac-purple through all shades of red and crimson, the complimen- 

 tary shades of yellow, orange, and ivory-white being supplied by 

 occasional groups of coloured Azaleas, with their sunrise and sunset 

 shades and hues. There are, no doubt, far finer collections of 

 Rhododendrons in Ireland, as also in Cornwall and Devon and 

 elsewhere, but the great charm at Howth is that the picturesque 

 position and the grouping of the Rhododendrons form such a 

 succession of pictures, no two alike. An old traveller, whom we met 

 here, told us : 'I have seen far finer Rhododendrons and far more 

 noble rocks, but I must say I have never seen such glorious masses 

 of colour and such picturesque rocks associated as they are here/ 

 The rocky slopes and rocky scarps, on which the shrubs are now so 

 beautiful, formed originally a sheltered little wood of Birch, Larch, 

 Scots Fir, Oak, Mountain Ash, and Hawthorn, overrun with 

 Woodbine, and in the more open spots by Gorse and Brambles. The 

 floor of the little forest then, as now, was carpeted with Bluebells 

 and Primroses, Stitchwort, Anemones, Wood Sorrel, and Ferns of a 

 stature not often seen, even in Ireland. There was but scant root room 

 in many places, and little or no soil, but men brought down and up 

 peat, earth, and leaf-mould to chink and cleft, or rocky hollows and 

 crevices, and to-day the result is seen and felt by all who, like the 

 Japanese, come here on a June- day pilgrimage to see the flowers-" 



Though such natural situations are impossible to many, they 

 are not at all essential for the cultivation or the good effect of 

 mountain-shrubs, as we have proof in the garden at Warley 

 Place, and other lowland gardens, where the rock shrubs 

 are such a feature, garlanding the outer parts of the 

 rock-gardens Wild Rose, Azalea, Furzes, Sun-Roses, Brooms, 

 Daphnes, and many other shrubs clustering about the banks 

 and often grouped on the turf. 



Whatever difficulty the cultivation of true alpine plants may 

 present in certain conditions, there is little or none in connection 

 with the mountain shrubs, and many of them are among the 

 hardiest shrubs of the mountains of N. America and Asia. 



D 



