CHAPTER XI 
OT many of the willows are very useful in a small garden, 
N but the dwarfs Salix reticulata and S. serpyllifola are 
happy in a cool and damp corner of the rockwork. Much 
moisture is essential. The latter of those above named I collected 
among the foothills of the Matterhorn, and in wet peat it has made 
a beautiful little specimen extending its tiny branches among 
Gentiana verna and other small creatures. Salix myrsinites jac- 
quimana dwells beside it—another very minute willow with neat 
catkins of purple. Of larger species I have a good weeping 
willow, S. ramulus aureus, whose golden rain of tresses in winter 
makes it beautiful. The catkins are also pure gold. S. sericea 
pendula, a pretty shrub with catkins of silver and pale gold, and 
the Japanese S. mutabilis, with wonderful catkins of lemon and 
scarlet, I also grow. ‘This latter species is peculiarly impatient of 
drought, and, since his feet are not in water, dislikes a hot summer 
exceedingly. 
Salsola fruticosa lacks charm, but I am giving this new shrub 
rope enough to hang itself. It may surprise me yet. 
Salvia dichroa, from the Atlas Mountains, is almost a shrub 
and, when prosperous, attains to six feet high, and presents you 
with flower spikes of white and purple two feet in length. An 
established plant of this is a magnificent sight ; but you must give 
it a warm and sunny corner in well-drained loam. 
Sambucus, the Elder, has some good varieties, of which I possess 
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