CHAPTER I 
O me the names that it has pleased man to bestow upon 
the works of nature are always interesting, and in this brief 
excursion I shall sometimes furnish derivation for many a 
household word in the gardener’s list. These you will find that you 
have forgotten, if, indeed, you ever knew them. Many are apposite, 
and many fatuous and grotesque. Imagination was needed in this 
matter, but Science saw no reason to invite the co-operation of those 
who possessed it. She muddled on, without the least poetic feeling 
for what she was about, and, as a result, a host of fine things are 
called after some utterly insignificant structural accident, while 
even more of them immortalise industrious nonentities with 
perfectly hideous names. Adam, at least, escaped this crime, 
for Tom, Dick and Harry were not invented when he opened 
his eyes in the Garden. 
In the case of Abelia, a shrub with which I may open my list, 
the quite euphonious word represents Dr. Clarke Abel, who visited 
China rather less than a hundred years ago, wrote an account of 
his journey in 1818, and passed in 1826. Not until some years 
after his death did Abelia come to England ; but now there are 
four or five of the species in cultivation, of which A. floribunda is 
easily the best. This handsome Mexican evergreen, with purple- 
crimson flowers, is prosperous in the West Country ; but it likes 
a wall, and, if in the open, should have winter protection. A. 
triflora and A. rupestris are good hardy shrubs from Hindustan 
9 B 
