Part I. 



THE ROCK-GARDEN. 



29 



few rough slabs, arranged so as to crop out from the soil in the 

 centre, completed the , preparation for the neater Sedums and 

 Sempervivums, such Saxifrages as casta and Rocheliana, such 

 Dianthuses as alpinus and petrceus, Mountain Forget-me-nots, 

 Gentians, little spring bulbs, Hepatica angulosa, &c. They 

 were planted, the finer and rarer things getting the best positions, 

 and, when finished, the bed looked a nest of small rocks and 

 alpine flowers. 



In about eight weeks things had " taken so well," and the bed 

 looked so beautiful, from a dozen plants of Calandrinia umbellata 

 that had been planted on the little prominences flowering 

 so gaily and profusely as to make the arrangement equal to 



Fig. 27. — Small rocky bed of alpine flowers, about 6 ft. across. 



" It in not BrowinK Hko a treo 

 In bulk tliut mokes thinga better be." 



one of bedding plants from the " effective " point of view, that 

 another was made in the same manner, with more loam, how- 

 ever, to suit the different tastes of the alpines, and planted with 

 as different subjects from those in the other bed as could be got ; 

 confining them, however, to the choicest alpines, except on the 

 outer side of the largest stones of the margin, where such plants 

 as Campanula carpatica bicolor were planted with the best 

 results. 



The only attention these beds have required since planting has 

 been to keep a free-growing species' from over-running a subject 

 like Gentiana verna, to water the beds well in hot weather 

 — to keep them in fact thoroughly moist — and to remove even 

 the smallest weeds. With the exception of the exquisite 

 Gentiana bavarica, every alpine plant grew well, and the beds 

 presented fresh floral interest every week from the dawn ot 

 spring till late in autumn. 



I have described the way by which this happy result has been 

 brought about. An extended scheme of this sort would be ad- 



