BEST HARDY PERENNIALS 305 



ing to try, and may amuse others. But even the at- 

 tempt is possible only with strict and arbitrary limi- 

 tations, which are difficult to define and still more 

 difficult to keep. We will confine ourselves to fifty 

 hardy perennial plants. We will have nothing to do 

 with shrubs, thus avoiding roses, which could only 

 be treated in an anthology to themselves. Then how 

 about bulbs ? They, too, need an anthology to them- 

 selves. So we will leave them all out except Lilies, 

 which must be included because the Madonna Lily 

 cannot be left out. We will also confine ourselves to 

 border plants; and one of our chief tests shall be that 

 a plant can be easily grown in the ordinary garden. 

 This is to be an anthology for every one, not for the 

 specialist; and when we say easily grown, we mean 

 grown without fuss or constant renewal. Thus we 

 get rid of Carnations, which also need an anthology 

 to themselves. Our fifty best perennials must be 

 hardy, easily grown, and true perennials, or at least 

 perennial for some years. They must also, of course, 

 be beautiful; and where there is a great choice of 

 varieties we shall try to select one which excels in all 

 the qualities of a border plant. But, having laid 

 down these strict rules for our choice, we shall be 

 tempted to break them in one or two cases, where a 

 plant has such signal merits that it ought to be in 

 every garden, although it has also defects that ought 

 to exclude it from our anthology. We shall try to 

 make that anthology classical rather than romantic, 

 indulging in our own freaks of taste no more than we 



