zgo ALPINE FLOWERS. Part II. 



PRIMULA MUNEOI. — Mmird's Primrose. 



This has not the brilliancy or dwarfness of the Primulas of the 

 high Alps, nor the vigour of our own wild kinds, but it has the 

 merit of distinctness, and is of the easiest culture in any moist 

 'boggy soil. It grows at vbry high elevations on the mountains 

 of Northern India, in the vicinity of water, and bears creamy- 

 white flowers, with a yellowish eye, more than an inch across, pn 

 Stems five to seven inches high, springing from smooth green 

 leaves a couple of inches long, nearly as much across, and with 

 a heart-shaped base. The flowers are very sweet, -and altogether 

 it highly merits culture in a moist spot on the -select rock- 

 work, or in a bog, and flowers from March to May. P. involu- 

 crata is a very closely allied kind, from the same regions, some- 

 what smaller, the leaves not heart-shaped at the base, and the 

 plant not quite so ornamental. It thrives under the same con- 

 ditions as its. relative. ..>,.,,■ 



PRIMULA TSiVI'E.K.— Snowy Primrose. 



A DWARF and neat species, freely producing trusses of lovely 

 White flowers, quite distinct in aspect from any other in culti- 

 vation, happily very easy of culture, and may be grown in pots or 

 in the open ground. 'If in pots, it should be frequently divided ; 

 for it has a tendency, in common with other choice Primulas, 

 to get somewhat naked aboiit the base of the shoots, and, as 

 these protrude rootlets, the Whole plant is likely to go off if 

 not taken up and divided into as many pieces as possible. 

 Every shoot will form a plant, inasmuch as each is usually fur- 

 nished with little rootlets, which take hold of fresh soil imme- 

 diately. Many people keep plants of Primulas like this for 

 years in the centre of the sanie pot, whereas by dividing them 

 and placing them down to the leaves in fresh soil much finer 

 specimens may be obtained. In a wild state the natural mois- 

 ture, and perhaps the accumulating debris of the mountains, 

 enable them to use those exposed rootlets and thrive ; but in 

 cultivation I have found it an excellent plan to divide such fine 

 Primulas as this, and plant them down to the leaves when their 

 stems have grown at all above the soil ; and I have no doubt 

 that careful annual division would suit them well. On dry 

 ground, it would have little or no chance unless surrounded by a 



