248 The Wild Garden 



books rarely or never show the beauty of plants 

 as they grow, and as very few have opportunities 

 of seeing the plants on the hills when in flower. 

 One who grew the more beautiful species might 

 give rare pleasure to people who cared for our 

 native mountain plants. 



Silybum Marianum, the Milk thistle ; Carduus erio- 

 phorus, a noble thistle — found chiefly in the limestone 

 districts of the south of England — and the great, woolly, 

 silvery Cotton thistle, as it is often called, are hand- 

 some plants. One isolated plant or a group or two 

 will be sufficient for ordinary gardens ; but where 

 there is sufficient spaCe these, with many other fine 

 wild plants, might be naturalized by sowing a few of 

 the seeds in any waste place, or in the shrubbery. 

 The Milk thistle, with its shining green leaves and 

 white markings, is very desirable among the British 

 plants, though scarcely so much so as the great 

 Cotton thistle. 



The common Corn-flower (Centaurea Cyanus) is 

 a beautiful garden plant, if sown in autumn: sown 

 in spring, it is not so strong. I know of nothing 

 more beautiful than a bold group of the Corn-flower in 

 spring and early summer ; the bloom is so lasting, the 

 flowers so pretty for cutting. One of the prettiest of 

 dwarf trailing silvery plants is the woolly Diotis 

 maritima, which is found on the southern shores of 

 England, coming up as far as Anglesea on the west 

 and Suffolk on the east, but generally a rare plant 



