July 17, 1895.] 



Garden and Forest. 



281 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office: Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by Professor C. S. Saugent. 



ENTERED AS SECOI^D-CLASS MATTER AT THE POST-OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, JULY 17, 1895. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



Editorial Articles :— Old-fashioned Gardens ■. . . 2S1 



A Northern Forest. (With figure.) 282 



The June Flora ot a Long Island Swamp -/;/«(( Ahtrray Vail, 282 



Foreign CoRREsroNDENCE : — London Letter IV, IVatsmi. 2S4 



Plant Notes 284 



Cultural Department : — American Irises y, N, Gerai-d. 286 



Midsummer Care of Chrysanthemums T. D, Hatfield. 287 



Some Showy Perennials R. Ctiiiiero7i. 287 



Three Good Plants E. O. Orpet. 288 



Strawberries E. P, P. 288 



Correspondence :— Stones as a Source of Fertility T, H. Hoshins, M.D. 288 



R ECENT Publications 289 



Notes ' 290 



Illustration 1 — Forests on the Thompson River, British Columbia, Fig. 40 285 



Old-fashioned Gardens. 



MOST things move in cycles, and contemporaneously 

 with the reappearance of our grandmothers' sleeves 

 and petticoats' the taste for old-fashioned gardens is re- 

 vived. There is a fresh call for the perennials and annuals 

 which enlivened the borders of long ago, and those who 

 are fortunate enough to still possess one of these old-time 

 gardens show with pride the long-treasured plants which 

 have bloomed for so many years. We are apt to think that 

 we know a good deal more about flowers than our progen- 

 itors, but the fact is there was, perhaps, more variety than 

 there is to-day in many of their collections. Much time 

 is given now to the development of perfect specimens and 

 to the cultivation of new varieties, both in greenhouse and 

 garden ; but if we were to look over some of the venerable 

 catalogues we should find that if we planted all that our 

 grandsires did we should have our hands and gardens full, 

 without anything new. 



McMahon's American Gardeners' Almanac, published in 

 1806, gives a list of four hundred hardy perennials and 

 biennials for the garden, with a hundred and twenty hardy 

 annuals, including climbers, and among these we find 

 many plants which are supposed to be comparatively new. 

 Those early settlers in America who were well to do de- 

 voted much care to their gardens, and in the formal fashion 

 of the day laid out their geometrical walks and box-bordered 

 beds and tilled them with all sorts of sweet-smelling or 

 showy posies which are forever associated in our minds 

 with our grandmothers who loved them. The early colo- 

 nists found new and wonderful flowers blossoming in the 

 woods and fields of the new country and transplanted them 

 into their borders, and sent specimens of them to their old 

 home, receiving in return slips and seeds of the dear old 

 .shrubs and plants which were full of association to their 

 homesick hearts. The interest on this siiie of the Atlantic 

 kept pace with that in Europe, and only twenty years after 

 the founding of the London Horticultural Society the little 

 town of Boston in 1838 organized it§ own and showed a 

 laudable interest in bringing up the floricultural standard. 



In those early gardens all sorts of bulbous plants were 



grown, the passion for Tulips, which was at its height in 

 Europe about the begimiing of the eighteenth century, hav- 

 ing lasted longer in the colonies ; and the records show 

 that Hyacinths and other early-blooming flowers were 

 raised in great perfection and profusion. 



Geraniums, Pseonies, Pansies, Pinks, Balsams, Four- 

 o'clocks and Dahlias made their appearance in the borders 

 in brave show. Columbines of various colors nodded 

 everywhere. Lilies and Roses, then as now, were the joy 

 of the gardener, and the trade-list of Parsons & Co., Flush- 

 ing, Long Island, as early as 1830, contained over seven hun- 

 dred kinds of Roses, while already two thousand different 

 varieties had been named, though hybridization was then 

 in its infancy. The China Aster and the Chrysanthemum 

 were comparatively new and small, for the China Asters 

 only began to reach England in 1730, and the improved 

 sorts are of much later date, while the Chrysanthemum 

 was but a sturdy little ball in the beginning of the nine- 

 teenth century, and was alluded to as "a neglected flower " 

 as late as 1842. Carnations in many varieties, plain and 

 striped, perfumed the air. There were the Flakes with 

 stripes of two colors going the whole length of the petals. 

 There were freckled and spotted ones, and Painted Ladies, 

 with a white underpart to the petal, while the upper sur- 

 face was red or purple, as if laid on with a brush. These 

 latter have now so disappeared that few growers know 

 they ever existed. Even the spotted ones have their colors 

 now conhned to the outer edge of the petals, and the 

 freckles have gone out of fashion. Who does not remem- 

 ber the Clove Pinks which were such universal favorites, 

 endless in variety, fragrant and fringed, and the little 

 Maiden's Pink, which came so early, and the Chinese Pinks, 

 ■ft'ith their deeply toothed petals .? 



There were Larkspurs, which sprang up everywhere, in 

 all sorts of colors, from palest blue to indigo, from pure 

 white to deep pink, with flowers poised like bees upon their 

 stems, and stately stalks which lifted them high in air. 

 There vi'ere masses of fragrant Stocks and rows of Balsams, 

 whose impatient seeds flew at a touch, and bunches of the 

 Sweet William, which seems now the most old-fashioned 

 of flowers, and the Scarlet Lychnis, its appropriate neigh- 

 bor, with stiff tall stem and red head aflame. We called it 

 London Pride, but in England that name is given to Saxi- 

 fraga umbrosa. 



In June the beds were all ablaze with bouncing Pa?onies, 

 shading from white to deepest crimson, and later came the 

 French Marigolds, in all shades of gold. There were Can- 

 terbury Bells, white and blue, and tall white Tuberoses of 

 sickly sweetness, and Phloxes, white and pink, and big 

 double Buttercups as large as little Roses, and the many- 

 colored Marvel of Peru. Scarlet Bee Balm was a delight 

 all summer long, and the Feverfew grew rank beside it. 

 Who can forget the fragrant rows of Sweet Peas, which 

 have never grown old-fashioned, and the swarms of Pop- 

 pies of all kinds and hues, and the Clematis which climbed 

 and trailed at its own will ; and the wandering Honey- 

 suckles and Sweetbrier which hummed with bees.' 



The charm of those old gardens was in their wealth and 

 tangle of bloom. One plant leaned upon another. There 

 was no room for weeds, for each flower stood cheek-by- 

 jowl with a neighbor and frowned down the humble 

 intruders. There was always a little shade in those gar- 

 dens, perhaps a Pear-tree or two, or a choice Plum, which 

 enjoyed the same care received b}^ the blossoms, and re- 

 warded in its turn with friendly shade. The spirit of those 

 gardens came from the hands that tended them and culled 

 their fragrant produce. They breathed love and thought 

 and patient tending, and grew as flowers only grow for 

 those who love them. Stiff in outline they might be, hut 

 the rampant growth of well-tended shrubs and perennials 

 hid all straight lines and carpeted t.he paths with falling 

 petals. One flowerafter another broke bounds and stretched 

 over to its neighbor across the walk. The old Rose-bushes 

 never would stay in place, but sent forth long shoots which 

 dripped fragrance. The hedges were sweet with Haw- 



