244 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 330. 



length, and are borne on a long spike. The stems are 

 straight and simple and very leafy. The lower leaves are 

 two inches or more in length and are gradually reduced 

 in size until they become small bracts at the top. 



Many vines are now in blossom, with inconspicuous 

 greenish flowers, but their handsome foliage and, later, the 

 fruit will make up for lack of beauty in the flowers. 



During the past month of cloudy and rainy weather the 

 foliage has developed rapidly. I cannot recall any spring- 

 time when there has been so much color in the leaves of 

 certain trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants -as there is 

 now. The chlorophyll has not developed as fast as the 

 leaves have grown, and the result is that the tender foliage 

 exhibits the color of mature leaves in all shades of red, 

 pink and purple; but a few days of sunshine will give 

 them their green color. 



At this season the birds in the Pines often lure us from 

 the flowers. The manners of the catbirds, the thrushes 

 and the song and vesper sparrows that live in the Pines 

 are very different from those of the civilized birds that live 

 in our gardens and on our lawns. Some of thes*e wild 

 birds make much ado over our presence on their domain, 

 while others, like the quail and snipe, keep perfectly quiet 

 and try to deceive us, at times even feigning death. On 

 the margin of a swamp I was attracted by the mottled ap- 

 pearance of something on a bed of green moss. Upon a 

 nearer approach I thought it a lifeless bird, and as I brought 

 my hand down to take it up, it startled me by flying 

 almost into my face, and then half-flying, rolling and 

 tumbling away, as if badly wounded ; it was evidently 

 trying to lure me in pursuit of itself, uttering mean- 

 while not a sound. It was somewhat larger than a quail, 

 a Wilson's snipe, Gallinago Wilsonii, and was brooding 

 four young ones not yet old enough to skulk and hide. As 

 the mother hurriedly rose in her precipitate flight she over- 

 turned two of the brood and left them lying flat on their 

 backs. And how dead they all were, except their bright 

 eyes! Their long bills were hugged close to their breasts, 

 and their dark-colored long legs were drawn close to their 

 bodies. I called the botanical hunters to come and see the 

 little frauds simulate death, and we stood around them 

 laughing and talking, but they were equal to the trying 

 ordeal, and did not move a muscle, though they watched 

 us closely with their shining eyes. We left them and re- 

 turned in about half an hour. The mother was still near 

 by in the bushes trying to attract our attention to herself. 

 The young ones were in the same positions as before, with 

 the exception that one of them had straightened out a leg 

 which looked stiff and rigid. We were all too kindly dis- 

 posed to touch the little things, and left them on their bed 



of moss as we had found them, 

 vinebnd. n.j. Mary Treat. 



Foreign Correspondence. 

 London Letter. 



New Plants. — A sale of a somewhat novel character 

 took place to-day at the auction-rooms of Messrs. Protheroe 

 & Morris, who offered the entire stocks of thirty of Messrs. 

 Lindens' new plants which have not yet been sent out. It 

 is usual for such establishments as the famous Brussels 

 Nurseries, over which the Messrs. Linden preside, to jeal- 

 ously watch over all such new plants and to distribute 

 them, partly for the honor and glory of the thing. The 

 reason given for this new departure is that Messrs. Lin- 

 den, having no room for propagating on a large scale their 

 new introductions of fine foliage-plants (their houses be- 

 ing occupied by extensive importations of Orchids), have 

 decided to sell by auction, every spring, the entire set, 

 each in one lot, of their discoveries. 



Most of their new plants are valuable for hybridizing, 

 and many of them have received first-class certificates at 

 the meetings and at the Temple shows of the R. H. S. 

 A part of the plants offered in this sale were exhibited at 

 the great Temple show, on May 23d, 24th and 25th, where 



they were awarded eleven first-class certificates, a silver 

 cup being awarded for the group. They comprised new 

 Tree-ferns, Begonias, Marantas, Tradescantias, various 

 Aroids, Haemanthus Lindeni, etc. Evidently the auction- 

 room has now become a much more important factor in 

 commercial horticulture than it has ever been before. 



Gmelina hystrix. — The genus Gmelina consists of eight 

 species of Asiatic trees and shrubs, and is related to Clero- 

 dendron. G. hystrix is the most ornamental of them, 

 judging by a specimen of it now flowering for the first 

 time at Kew. It has a stout, woody stem, with long, 

 slender Bougainvillea-like shoots clothed with bright green 

 •ovate or lobed leaves and bearing drooping terminal 

 cymes of large, yellow flowers which spring from large, 

 ovate, overlapping, brownish bracts. The corolla is 

 tubular and divided at the top into four segments, the 

 lowest of which is much the largest. The plant grows 

 freely in a moist stove. According to Mr. Goldring, who 

 brought this plant from Baroda, it is a most useful shrub 

 in Indian gardens, and one which can be utilized there for 

 fences, as it grows quickly and develops strong spines. A 

 figure has been prepared from the Kew plant for publica- 

 tion in the Botanical Magazine. 



Eupatorium serrulatum has lately been introduced from 

 Brazil by Monsieur E. Andre, to whose energy horticul- 

 ture is indebted for many new and useful plants, Senecio 

 sagittifolius being one of the most recent. The Eupato- 

 rium has long been known to botanists as a shrub about 

 four feet high, with ovate, serrated, hairy leaves from one 

 to three inches long, and numerous terminal compound 

 panicles of bright rose-purple flowers, the strongest 

 branches producing heads six inches across. It grows 

 as freely and flowers as profusely as any of the Eupatori- 

 ums already in cultivation, and, no doubt, will thrive 

 under the same kind of treatment. For. such places as the 

 Riviera and California it will be an acquisition as a hardy 

 shrub. Monsieur Andre informed Mr. Gumbleton, to 

 whom he sent the specimens which I saw, that this plant 

 would prove a good acquisition for his garden at Belgrove, 

 and no one who knows Mr. Gumbleton "would venture to 

 recommend any but really good plants to him. 



Polypodium Schneiderianum is said to be a hybrid be- 

 tween P. aureum — one of the best-known and largest of trop- 

 ical species — and P. vulgare, var. elegantissimum, a garden 

 form of our common wild Polypody. A fine specimen of 

 the hybrid was shown by Messrs. J. Veitch & Sons at the 

 Temple show last week, and I believe it originated in their 

 nursery. It is a most graceful plant, forming a specimen 

 a yard through, with large arching bipinnate fronds ele- 

 gantly subdivided into teeth or lobes. It will thrive in an 

 ordinary greenhouse, and is likely to become popular for 

 the conservatory. A first-class certificate was awarded to it. 



Adiantum reniforme asarifolium is a distinct and pretty 

 variety of the Kidney Maidenhair, differing from the type 

 in having stipes a foot long aiid thick, glaucous green 

 blades. It was introduced to Kew from Mauritius a few 

 years ago. Some fine examples of it were among the 

 Ferns exhibited by Messrs. J. Veitch & Sons last week. 



Rosa spinosissima, var. grandiflora, is the most attractive 

 single-flowered Rose among themanyspecies and varieties 

 which are now in flower at Kew. The type, the Scotch or 

 Burnet Rose, is well known to your readers, and appears 

 to be as delightful in your gardens as it is here. But this 

 variety is a very different-looking plant, and can only be 

 accepted as a form of the Scotch Rose in an extreme sense. 

 Mere it is planted in a large oblong bed on one of the lawns 

 skirting a walk, and the bed is now a miniature forest of 

 leafy shoots two to three feet long, with scarcely any 

 bristles, healthy green foliage, and crowded with beautiful 

 single flowers, three inches across, say, as large as those of 

 Cistus laurifolius, milk-white, with a small maroon eye 

 formed by the stamens. It is a most lovely Rose, and as 

 happy under cultivation as a Sweet-brier. According to 

 Lindley, who figured it in his Botanical Register (t. 888), this 

 plant is a native of Siberia, whence it was introduced in 



