120 Hybrids and Others 



to none in popular esteem is S. Irvingi. It originated 

 at Kew, and is named in compliment to Mr. Walter 

 Irving, chief of the hardy plant department there. 

 But an inch or so high, its crowd of pink-tinted 

 flowers, which in March attract everybody, renders it 

 unique. A gem for the alpine house and of the easiest 

 cultivation. Of considerable utility is S. Elizabethse, 

 of which apparently there are several variations, seed- 

 lings, probably, of the same cross. Near akin are 

 Mrs. Leng and L. S. Godseff, and all have pale yellow 

 flowers. None are strictly of the "cushion" type, 

 their free habit and abundant flowering fitting them 

 for greater display in more generous array elsewhere. 

 S. Paulinae is, however, a gem of the cushion set, 

 whose yellow flowers are but little inferior to Boydii. 

 Albeit they are paler in colour, the hybrid ranks high 

 with the best. Its fine glaucous habit, too, is dis- 

 tinct. Quite an indispensable. The popular and 

 invaluable S. apiculata must also be referred to here, 

 since if a " cushion " Saxifrage at all, it is on a major 

 scale and not of the pigmy tribe that the name is wont 

 to suggest. S. apiculata and its white-flowered 

 varieties are so vigorous habited, too, that they are 

 occasionally grown in the front of the border or as 

 edgings : hence well suited for display purposes in 

 the rock garden. Among the earliest to flower, it is 

 not until March that the heyday of flower beauty is 

 reached, when they vie with any that then obtain. 



Encrusted or Silvery Saxifrages 



These are distinct from all, bolder generally in 

 habit of growth, while embellishing the summer sea- 

 son with their flower beauty. In winter-time, too, 

 the best of them are of high ornament, silvery or 

 hoary rosettes, freely colonised when flowers are 

 rare, playing an important part amid the vegetable 

 life around. In flower, however, they are of the pic- 

 ture-making order, when gracefully arching plumes, 



