January 20, 1912.] 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE. 



33 



THE 



curling, the blossoms of Rhododendron 



6;ubeners'Cbrontclc 



No. 1,308— SATUBDAY, January 20, 1912. 



the woods and copses of the Levant — for 



lapponicum are on the point of opening, instance, round Brusa and Constantinople. 



and a day of sun on a hot slope will un- 

 seal the first goblets of Crocus Imperati. _ 



These few glints, relics or promises, be a very old inhabitant of our 



CONTENTS. 



44 



37 



42 

 33 



Apple trees in grass land 44 

 Apples, the colouring of 44 

 Autumn flowers in the 



houih-west 36 



Benevolent Institution, 



Gardeners' Royal 42, 45 

 Bookp, notices of — 

 Journal of the R.H.S. 



Club 41 



Roses ... 40 



Clematis Jouiniana ... 34 

 Cypripediums at Oak- 

 wood Gardens, Cray- 

 ford ... 



French flower garden, 



notes from a 



Gardening, the teaching 



of, in schools 



Grey dawn of the year, the 

 Hardy flower border — 

 Hollyhocks and Cal- 

 ceolarias 44 



Heliophila scandens ... 42 

 Hooker, Sir Joseph, the 



life of 43 



International Horticul- 

 tural Exhibition, 1912 42 



Kew gardeners' social 

 evening 41 



Lilium longiflorum as a 



pot plant 43 



Morsea sinensis 37 



Obituary— 



Birch, Geo 46 



Brooker, Henry ... 46 



Carlton, Wm 46 



Deacon, John 46 



Denning, C 46 



Durand, M. Theophile 46 



Uzzell, Mrs 46 



Watson, Wm 46 



Orchid notes and glean- 

 ings- 

 Orchids at Broadlands, 



Tunbridge Wells ... 35 



Plants, new or note- 

 worthy — 

 Ulmus Plotii ... 



Rainfall in 1911 



Rat-catching 



Rosary, the — 



Rose Wm. Allen Rich- 



arcaon 



Some seedling varie- 

 ties of Frau Karl 



Druschki 



Scotland, notes from 

 Snow storm in the Mid- 

 lands ... 

 Societies- 

 British Gardeners' As- 

 sociation 



Edinburgh Market 



Gardeneis' 



National Chrys. 

 National Dahlia 

 Perpetual - flowering 

 Carnation 



Royal Caledonian Hort. 



Royal Horticultural 



(Scientific Committee) 



S o c i 6 1 6 Francaise 

 d'Hort. de Londres 



Stirling Chrys 



Surveyors' Institution 



Women's Agricultural 



and Hort. Union ... 



Strobilanthes, species of, 



in South India 



Sweet Pea disease 

 Sweet William rust 

 Weathers, Mr. John ... 

 Week's work, the — 



Apiary, the 



Flower garden, the ... 



Fruits under glass ... 



Hardy fruit garden ... 



Kitchen garden, the ... 



Orchid houses, the ... 



Plants under glass ... 



35 

 41 

 44 



make up nearly all the show there is in the 

 garden to-day. Eain continues almost un- 

 ceasing, until one's Sahara's have become 

 N, American lakes. Saxifraga florulenta 



And, like many other plants which we owe 

 to Byzantium, the rosy Primrose seems to 



gardens, 

 Parkinson 



(newly planted) and S. Candelabrum have 

 fled home before the deluges ; but 

 44 Eritrichium, unprotected, still survives 

 for the moment, and so do the high An- 

 drosaces, helvetica, Haussmannii and 

 cylindrical The Primulas, though now at 

 their deadest moment, are making ready 



34 

 42 



44 



42 



45 

 45 

 41 



42 

 45 



45 



42 

 45 

 41 



39 



41 

 36 

 44 

 42 



39 



38 



39 

 39 

 38 

 S9 



38 



their new core of 



P. acaulis 



green : 

 rubra, even, desperately blossoms right 



December, and a few 



through 



wan, 

 Primroses 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Clematis Jouiniana 



Cup presented to Mr. Crump, V.M.H., at Worcester 



Deacon, John, portrait of the late 



Durand, M. Theophile, portrait of the late 



Fruit bowl presented to Mr. Wade, at Worcester ... 



Lilium longiflorum 



Moraea sinensis 



Pear Mrs. Seden 



Strobilanthes, species of, growing wild in South India 

 (Supplementary Illustration). 



34 

 42 



46 

 46 

 42 

 43 

 S7 

 36 



THE GREY DAWN OF THE 



YEAR. 



ITH the end of the first week of 



sodden blooms appear on 

 and Polyanthuses less distinguished. But 

 the glory of the whole garden at present is 

 a Primula, for, on the cliff, P. Allionii 

 chooses this especial moment of the season 

 to be so pertinaciously beautiful that 

 nothing can rival it. Almost all my tiny 

 collected rosettes of 1910, stuck into 

 chinks, are either now in flower, or just 

 over, or soon to open. Clcse on the tuft 

 lies the single enormous flower, so brilliant 

 and solid, that neither rain, nor snow, nor 

 frost, nor time seem to have the slightest 

 effect upon its apparent fragility. One 

 great rosy bloom that I lef; well opened 

 when I went to Scotland on December 21 

 was still in solid and flawless splendour 

 on January 11. No plant has issued 

 more than one flower to an effort so far ; 

 but the effect of their effulgence on the 

 dark, dank walls of wet limestone is more 

 radiant than anything else in the garden 



even the combined magnificence of all the 

 Christmas Roses. 



Primula "amcena." 



w 



although in the Farad is us, 

 seems to have no note of it. It is certainly 

 the parent of the double mauve, which is. 

 often such a glory in common cottage 

 days, and such a miff in the delicate 

 borders of the wealthy. But, however 

 cherished and famous be the double, the 

 old single is far more rare and, to my think- 

 ing, far more charming. I have had plants, 

 of it from several private sources, but 

 my best pieces came accompanied by 

 a photograph showing its full luxuriance ; 

 at present, in different stations of the gar- 

 den, my three tufts are bravely and freely 

 blooming, and have continued bloomin 

 throughout the midnight of the year which 

 is now beginning to break in a grey damp 

 dawn. 



Galanthus Elwesii poculiformis. 



Some seasons since, a Snowdrop ap- 

 peared here in a stray corner of the kitchen 

 garden. It w T as no accident, as in a line 

 w^ith it came up also a flow r er of G. Fosteri, 

 But though many memories have tried to 

 make good the lack of data, no one has 

 ever found out definitely whence or as 

 what the plant was bought. It lingered 

 obscurely until one fine day I was struck 

 with the exquisite beauty of its three pure 

 white petals — the inner no less perfectly 

 pure than the outer segments. I sent a 

 description of it to Mr. Bowles, w T ho at 

 once replied " Galanthus poculiformis." 

 There the matter rested, until I happened 

 to visit Myddelton House in Snowdrop 

 time, and among the stalwart beauties 

 noticed a rather short-stemmed, frail and 

 pining plant. I enquired what it might be. 

 When I was told that it was G. poculi- 



It is now many years since I first read formis I knew and declared at once that 

 January, the dead midnight of the Mr. Robinson's account of an apparently my Snowdrop was different from it 



year has already gone. 



But such charming Primula amcena from the Bithy- 



m everything but the cupped and 

 spotless petals, for mine had twice the 



has been the devastating wetness of the nian Olympus. The plant was, it seemed, 



season that it is hard for any flower to an early-flowering P. acaulis, with rosy or stature, twice the vigour, twice the splen- 



raise its head from the cold and soggy mauve flowers appearing before the leaves. dour of blossom. The end of it all was (for 



earth. Planting a Pine tree just at present This Primula I long sought for, and from I myself have no lore in the minute freck- 



is rather like planting a Water Lily in many catalogues ordered. I got many odd lings that differentiate the Snowdrops) that 



more favourable moments. None the less, things in my time, but I never got Robin- Mr. Bowles made a pilgrimage to my plant, 



the garden is not wholly bare. The Christ- son's P. amcena. Now, in the first place, and on seeing it at once recognised it as a 



mas Roses, in fact, stimulated, no doubt, the specific name is wrong, though P. perfect poculiformis form of true Galan- 



by the hot summer, are, and for months amcena (Marsch) is a true species, native thus Elwesii— a treasure hitherto unknown 



have been and for months will continue, a of Caucasus and rosy-purple flowered. to him and unguessed. It is indeed a most 



glory such as I have never seen them here ^ * s m close to P. elatior, not to P. splendid Snowdrop, by far the most beau- 



before, nor could I easily have believed it acaulis, and accordingly produces its tiful of all I know— hardly less so in the 



rich nobility of its broad, glaucous leaves 



flowers in an umbel on a 4 inch to 6 inch 



possible w ithout artificial covering of some 

 kind to shield their w r hiteness from snow 

 and wet. From the old year, Colchicum the track of P. altaica as representing 



cilicicum still lingers gaily here and there, 



stem. Failing oi P. amoena, I was put on and upstanding stems, than in the solid and 



of its great pendent 



Robinson 7 s amcena. 



Still 



snowy magnficence 



no success. bells of white ; the inner segments cupped 



cups of soft and varied crimson gallantly Lehmann^s P. altaica comes under P. and pure as the outer, unmarred by any of 



that green marking which gives such a 

 nipped and chilly tone to all the other 

 Snowdrops. It is a bulb of notable vigour, 



appearing, and the more gallantly in that farinosa P. altaica (Pallas), is that form 

 the bulbs only arrived in September of Oxlip now called P. elatior Pallasii ; 



from their home. And 



altaica 



quickly sending its heralds ahead, pearls of hope when I saw its authority, proves and very early in bloom, for the divided 

 are showing in their pink setting on the only the equally umbelliferous form younglings of last year, dug up in flower 

 cushions of Saxifraga Burseriana, and " genuina " of the true P. amoena. And, (that Mr. Bowles might have his journey's 

 early Galanthus Fosteri and G. Elwesii all the time, the Robinson plant, so worth at once) are all in stalwart blossom 

 poculiformis are already past their prime untraceable in the homes of the learned, here already, long before any other Snow- 

 before the Aconites have shown more than lay quite ready to my hand in the gardens drop in the garden, except two magnificent 

 a gleam of gold, or Galanthus Elwesii any of the simple. Robinson's Primula amcena stray flowers (with petals very heavily 

 colour of flower at all. A very early violet- is nothing but P. acaulis rubra, that rosy- stained with green) that came to me a year 

 coloured Crocus is thinking about un- purple form of the Primrose, which haunts or tw T o ago from the East in a lot of 



