12TH NOVEMBER. 



MY COTYLEDON terrace is now thoroughly satisfying 

 in fact, extremely pleasing to the eye. In this country, coty- 

 ledons are little thought of: people have a way of making 

 horrible dog's grave rockeries with a dried-up Cotyledon on 

 the top enough to put anyone against them. It was not until 

 I saw, years ago, an exhibit of cotyledons at the Chelsea Show, 

 put up by Mr. Theobald, that I realized what could be done with 

 them. Every plant was perfect not a damaged leaf; all 

 looked the picture of health. Many of them were covered 

 with white " bloom " and what a job he had to keep the crowd 

 from stroking them (" Just feel how soft they are, dear ! "), 

 leaving the marks of their fingers as green patches on the 

 beautiful white leaves. Mine are not so good as that ; they 

 grow outside and stand up to all sorts of weathers but they 

 are very attractive. 



Our over- worked botanists give them scant attention. I 

 have half a dozen or more which, to the gardener's eye, are 

 quite distinct, but they are all called Cotyledon orbiculata. The 

 foliage of all is usually grey, whitish or pale green. I planted 

 them at intervals in clumps the length of the terrace where 

 they show to advantage against the red soil. Between them I 

 planted Drosanthemum speciosum, whose attractive yellow-green 

 foliage is good all the year and just now its bushes are covered 

 with flame-coloured flowers. Then here and there on the edge 

 of the terrace are plants of a particularly good Pelargonium 

 which has no name. The botanists insist that it is hybrid 

 and I must own that it very much resembles one I knew 

 in England as Pelargonium Moorei. It has the divided 

 leaf of the scented geraniums so beloved by the cottage 

 gardeners of England, but the flower heads are showy with 

 their blood-red flowers tightly packed in good-sized heads. 

 The habit of the plant is semi-prostrate, and it looks well growing 

 over the edge of a wall. I have never known it to make a seed. 

 I found it originally on some flat ground near the mountains, 

 where there had once been a cottage and a garden on a farm 

 in the Tulbagh district ; but I saw it again years later at a 



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