Subtropical Gardening. 



21 



The Solanums. — This family, so wonderfully varied, affords 

 numerous species that look fine and imposing in leaf when in a young 

 and free-growing state. In the nursery garden of the city of Paris 

 there is, entirely devoted to the family, a very large house in which 

 are preserved over the winter months more than sixty species for 

 the embellishment of Parisian gardens. But in selecting from this 

 great genus we must be much more careful, as our climate is a shade 



Fig. 7. — Solanum Warscewiczii. 



too cold for them, and many of them are of too ragged an aspect 

 to be tolerated in a tasteful garden. Half-a-dozen or more species 

 are indispensable, but quite a crowd of narrow-leaved and ignoble 

 ones may well be dispensed with. The better kinds — as seen both 

 in London and Paris gardens — are marginatum, robustum, macran- 

 thum, macrophyllum, Warscewiczii, crinipes, callicarpum, jubatum, 

 Quitoense, galianthum, hippoleucum, crinitum, and Fontainesianum, 

 an annual with pretty leaves, crisped and distinct looking. 



