AuGUsi 14, 1889.] 



Garden and Forest. 



395 



by Perra and Lobel in their "Adversaria," 1570, under the 

 name of Gramen siilcatuin vel. striatum album, as also by 

 Dalechanipius in 1587; by Lobel in 1591 and Tabernaemonta- 

 nus, 1590; Gerarde, 1597 and 1636, and by J. Bauliin in 1650. 

 It is described by Canierarius in 1588; Baiihin, 1596, 1623 and 

 1658; Parkinson, 1629; Ray, 1688; Morison, 1699; Tournefort, 

 1700; Sclieuchzer, 1719; Boerliaave, 1727, in two varieties, 

 and by Linn^us in 1737, in his " Hortus CHffortianns." In 

 1742 Wcinniann gives a colored figure. All these figures rep- 

 resent the grass in bloom, and nearly all olu" references speak 

 of the plant as variegated with white, and some say white, 

 greenish-white or of a purplish cast. Not one refers to the 

 golden variegation which characterizes the Nonquit plant. 

 The vernacular names given by Bauhin in 1658 are : German, 

 Spannischgrass, Welschgrass, Strmiechtiggrass ; Belgian, 

 Widtghestreept Gras ; English, Ladic Lace Grasse, or Painted 

 Grasse ; French, Aguillettes d'armes. Bauhin also says it is 

 grown for ornament in Germany, England and Belgium ; the 

 seed first brought from Spain, although also wild in Savoy and 

 neighboring France. Linnaeus, in his "Species Plantarum," 

 says it grows in Europe in moistish places along river-banks. 



This grass is the Aruiido colorata, Ait., Digra^hia arundi- 

 nacea, Trin. var., Striped Grass, or Ribbon Grass, Bentham 

 and Hooker. In my library I find no record of the golden va- 

 riegation, nor of the name Ribbon Grass until quite recent 

 times. Gray, in his "Manual," says, Phalaris arundinacea, 

 L. var. picta, the leaves striped with white. The authors of 

 Flore Naturelle et Economique, Paris, 1803, say "il y en a une 

 variete a feuilles panacheis, qu'on nomme chiendentruban." 



Is this golden variegation common, or. have I been mis- 

 taken in identifying the species not seen in bloom ? This lat- 

 ter supposition does not seem probable, yet I think it is the 

 fact. It has been suggested by some autliors that this varie- 

 gated form readily reverts or changes to the common form, 

 and it is even said that it thus changes when removed from 

 dry to humid soil. How far is this idea correct ? One thing is 

 indeed noteworthy — that the variety, both wild and cultivated, 

 in its white form, has remained constant despite diverse 

 climates, from 1520 to the present time. It would be inter- 

 esting, also, if it were determined whether the many dis- 

 tributions have been from a common origin, or whether 

 this diversity has appeared spontaneously in diverse regions. 

 Who can throw light on this point? Gray notes the species 

 as indigenous to this country, and the variety as introduced. 

 Has any one noted the variety in sparsely settled regions, or 

 in what may be called a wilderness ? Does it occur along 

 with the common form ? I trust some observant reader of 

 Garden and Forest can answer some of these queries. 



South Framingham, Mass. E. Lewis Sturtevajlt. 



Insensibility to Odors. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — The instances given by your corespondent "T. B. F." 

 regarding insensibility to certain odors were quite interest- 

 ing. I can add but one touching the sense of smell. Violets, 

 whose fragrance is said to be delightful to most persons, and 

 which to Perdita were "sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes, 

 or Cytharea's breath," have, "to the writer, no other odor than 

 that which the sister of "J. B. F." finds in the Datura, namely : 

 " A certain earth-like smell proper to growing things in gen- 

 eral." 



With regard to the sense of taste, however, I recall the case 

 of a prominent Chicago physician, who declared that he could 

 detect no difference between the taste of Castor-oil and of Olive- 

 oil. To test the question, his wife dressed a salad with 01. 

 Ricin., whicli he partook of with great gusto, but not without 

 enjoying afterward all the remedial benefits of the drug. 



Santa Barbara, Cal. Frank M. GallaJlcr. 



[Perhaps the last instance cited is only another example 

 of inability to detect certain odors. The peculiar "flavor" 

 of castor-oil is conveyed through the olfactory nerves. 

 Children are directed not to breathe through the nose while 

 taking this medicine, and in this way they escape its dis- 

 agreeable "taste." The subject has interested many 

 readers. One writes: "it seems like an affectation to 

 say that Mignonette has any odor. It has no more to me 

 than a clean china plate." Another writes that the members 

 of his family frequently praise the delightful fragrance of 

 the flowers of a large vine of Cknialis crispa, now in full 

 bloom, while he has never yet been able to detect the 

 slightest odor in these flowers. — Ed.] 



Recent Publications. 



The Garden's Story; or, Pleasures and Trials of an Amateur 

 Gardener, by George H. Ellwanger. New York : D. Appleton 

 & Co., pp. 345. 



Under this some\N'hat fanciful title Mr. Ellwanger has written 

 a little book in which are agreeably mingled the practice and 

 poetry of hardy-flower gardening. Beyond all question a natural 

 arrangement of hardy herbaceous plants and shrubs and climb- 

 ers is the most effective and satisfactory way of adorning home 

 grounds. Without doing any violence to its essential character, 

 such agarden can be adjusted to the requirements of a village 

 lot, the enclosure about a country farmhouse or the more pre- 

 tentious surroundings of a suburban villa. It will unfold new 

 charms every day, from the hour when the first Snow-drop 

 shows its "vestal white and vernal green," until the last 

 Monk's-hood is faded and frozen. Even the winter does not 

 destroy such a garden, as it does one in which bedding-plants 

 and ribbon-lines are the principal features, but simply enables 

 it to rest for an awakening into fuller life. Next spring the 

 Daffodils and Spiraeas will be more abundant and beautiful 

 than they were last spring ; the vines will clothe rock and trunk 

 and treUis with richer drapery ; the shrub-border will show a 

 nobler sky-line and deeper shadows with Ijolder headlands and 

 more spacious bays, about and into which the greensward 

 Hows, and the whole design will have made a visible advance 

 toward a more perfect expression of the thought of its cre- 

 ator. A garden of such universal adaptability, of such constant 

 and varied beauty, and with a continuity of life which enables 

 its owner to plan hopefully for coming years, can well be 

 made an object of affectionate interest and wholesome recrea- 

 tion, and is by no means an imworthy subject for a writer like 

 Mr. Ellwanger, whose taste is refined without being fastidious, 

 whose love of nature is unaffected and catholic, and who can 

 speak on matters of practice out of the stores of abundant 

 experimental knowledge. 



Mr. Ellwanger wisely refrains from laying down any 

 specific garden-plans, for no two gardens worthy of the name 

 were ever fashioned after the same pattern. He attempts no 

 elaborate description even of his own garden. But, in a 

 pleasing and instructive way, he writes from different points of 

 view of the various elements and features of the garden and 

 their changing phases as the seasons hasten on. The novice 

 need not expect to find a garden already prepared for him on pa- 

 per, with maps and specifications, but he will find, when he lays 

 down the book, that his mind is furnished with a hundred 

 delightful pictures, like that of tall red Lilies rising from a bed 

 of Sensitive Fern, which will guide and restrain him when he 

 comes to make a garden of his own as no mere formulas or 

 precepts could. And those who already know what it is to 

 enjoy gardens of their own will follow with sympathy this 

 chronicle of a garden year in which their own trials and 

 triumphs are so pleasantly revived. The book is not a 

 formal treatise on garden art, nor a text-book of hardy plants, 

 nor a manual of cultural instruction, and yet it contains a 

 careful selection of herbaceous perennials, shrul)S and vines, 

 with admirable suggestions for arranging them, and practical 

 covnisel as to what is needed to make them take hold of the 

 ground and giow. A chapter on the rock garden, as dis- 

 tinguished from the chaotic stone-heap, popularly known as 

 " tlie rockery," and descriptions of the wild garden and 

 wood garden, reveal a deeper feeling for those aspects of 

 nature that are dainty and shy, or wild and wayward, than is 

 usually expected of one who celebrates the trim graces of a 

 more civilized garden. This appreciative love of nature will 

 not permit Mr. Ellwanger to think of his garden as fenced 

 in and complete in itself, but, as it makes its history with the 

 revolving year, a chronicle of the wild flowers as they blossom 

 runs beside it. The birds and butterfiies, too, are named and 

 welcomed in their order, and to this story of the interwoven 

 lives of plant, and bird, and insect, are added many extracts 

 from, and allusions to, the literature of flowers and seasons. 



In matters of detail we should feel constrained occasionally 

 to dissent from Mr. Ellwanger's judgment, as, for example, 

 when he pronounces a well-grown Lilium aiiratum, with a 

 stalk five or six feet high, supporting a dozen or more deli- 

 ciously-scented blooms, as the " grandest of all hardy 

 flowers." Such a specimen, if properly placed, might be 

 made most effective in the garden, but we should hardly rank 

 it the "grandest," even if the word is used in a restricted 

 sense to mean the " stateliest," of flowers. The list of desi- 

 rable [plants is not meant to be exhaustive, and yet, when so 

 much praise is given to the large-lioweretl garden forms of the 

 Clematis, one can hardly understand the omission of such fine 

 native species as C. coccinea, with its coral-colored flowers, C. 



