138 Alpine Plants. 
these cases, surfaced with a thin top-dressing of 
loam. 
During the making of the mounds, and before 
planting them, the soil should be well trodden down 
to ensure its being firm and to reduce after- 
shrinkage. When a plant especially requires or 
benefits by frequent top-dressing this may be pro- 
vided for, contrary to the general rule already 
enunciated, by planting it at the base of a gap or 
cleft intentionally retained, care being taken to 
avoid placing any plant above that would be injured 
by the consequent denudation. 
Many little plants like Myosotis rupicola may be 
grown most satisfactorily and effectively in narrow 
clefts and crevices, obtained by splitting large stones 
already forming part of the rockery with sledge- 
hammer and wedges, the wedges being allowed to 
remain in place until the plants have been inserted 
into the cracks thus provided for them, along with 
any packing which may be necessary to regulate 
the compression of soil about their roots consequent 
upon the withdrawal of the wedges. 
Woolly-leaved plants, such as Androsace sarmen- 
tosa, liable to damp off through wet in winter, are 
often better placed cn a slope with a pavement of 
flat slabs by their sides and on their lower verges 
Plants such as Onosma taurica, the collars and lower 
leafage of which require to be kept dry without 
depriving the roots of an abundance of moisture, are 
most suitably catered for by planting them between 
stones, buried in the soil to their upper edges, and 
arranged in the shape of an inverted and truncated V 
