CLIMBING PLANTS. 



287 



covered with markings like a calico print. One day, when the plant was 

 in blossom, I led some of my visitors to suppose that the flower might 

 be artificial, and 1 assured others of its reality. I afterwards found 

 both parties carefully examining the plant, and neither could decide 

 whether the flower was a real one or a mere sham made for the 

 purpose of practising a joke upon them. 



We have never succeeded well with the Clianthus Dampieti (fig. S94), 

 which evidently requires very special treat- 

 ment, and appears to be impatient of a damp 

 atmosphere. The colour of its flowers is 

 magnificent. 



It is impossible to dispense with Passion- 

 flowers. Perhaps one of the most useful 

 species is the Passiflora kermesina (fig. 595), 

 which flowers all the year 

 round. The young wood, 

 which is slender, hangs 

 down with a flower or 

 flower-bud growing from 

 the axil of every leaf. 

 Next to it in beauty, 



and perhaps even more Fig. 594.— CHanthus. Fig. 595.— Passiflora kermesina. 



brilliant in colour, is the P. racemosa. Racemes of scarlet flowers 

 hang down over green ferns, and set ofif a fernery by affording 

 the complementary colour to the green which is so essential to a 

 perfect efifect. The P. ccelestina is fine. I grow also P. Bellotti, 

 P. macrocarpa, P. quadrangularis, and the small but interesting 

 bat's-wing leaf white flowering species, but this latter is always 

 distasteful to gardeners because it is not sufficiently showy. The 

 best Passifloras to grow are P. kermesina (which is P. dentatd), P. 

 racemosa, P. ccelestina, and P. quadrangularis. The P. C(zrulea has been 

 frequently tried out of doors, and as frequently has died in winter. On 

 the high ground near Croydon it grows well, and becomes covered with its 

 beautiful golden fruit ; but even there it will not stand the cold in our 



