HARDY EXOTIC FLOWERING PLANTS. 127 
positions in large gardens it would be an improvement to allow 
the very walks or drives to become covered with very dwarf 
plants—plants which could be walked upon with little injury. The 
surface would be dry enough, being drained below, and would be 
more agreeable to the feet. Removing any coarse weeds that established 
themselves would be much easier than the continual hoeing and scraping 
required to keep the walk bare. Of course this only refers to walks in 
rough or picturesque 
places—the wild gar- 
den and the like—in 
which formal bare 
walks are somewhat 
out of place. 
Asphodel, Aspho- 
delus—The Asphodels 
are among the plants 
that have never been 
popular in the mixed 
border, nor are they 
likely to be so, the 
habit of the species 
being somewhat coarse 
and the flowering period 
not long, and yet they 
are of a stately and 
distizict order of beauty, 
which well deserves to 
be represented in open 
spaces, in shrubberies, 
or on their outer fringes. 
The plants are mostly Tall Asphodel in copse. 
natives of the countries 
round the Mediterranean, and thrive freely in ordinary soils. 
Lords and Ladies, Arum. — Mostly a tropical and sub-tropical 
family, some of which grow as far north as southern Europe. These 
are quite hardy in our gardens. The Italian Arum is well worthy of 
a place in the wild garden, from its fine foliage in winter. It should 
be placed in sheltered half-shady places where it would not suffer 
much from storms. The old Dragon plant (A. Dracontium) grows 
freely enough about the foot of rocks or walls in sandy, or dry, peaty 
