The Garden of British Wild Flowers. 205 



contrasted with hosts of Geraniums and showier 

 subjects, is a very doubtful way of attracting people 

 to study them ; but to give prizes for the rarest 

 plants of a locality, which in consequence are 

 exterminated to form part of a collection of this 

 kind, is very reprehensible. The system is bad, 

 root and branch, and should be discouraged by 

 every lover of wild flowers, as well as any other 

 plan that would cause quantities of our rarest plants 

 to be exterminated. 



In the Gentian order we have also the beautiful 

 Buckbean or Bogbean (Menyanthes trifoliata), a 

 plant that will grow on the margin of any water or 

 ditch or moist spot ; it even grows and flowers in 

 a moist border. It is a well-known and widely- 

 distributed plant — everywhere over Britain, in fact; 

 nevertheless, too much cannot be said in praise 

 of this singularly beautiful native, with its flowers 

 deeply and elegantly fringed on the inside with 

 white filaments, and its unopened buds tipped with 

 apple-blossom red. It is not often seen in a garden, 

 though no plant, British or exotic, is more worthy 

 of that position. It would be worthy of culture if 

 a stove were necessary for its preservation ; but, as 

 it is accommodating enough to grow strongly under 

 the same conditions as the water-cress, and is even 



