BETWEEN DIANTHUS AND EPILOBIUM 95 



not tell. It has varying descriptions, one of which is 

 suspiciously like that of glacialis. My plant, however, 

 is a thrifty, tight-growing Alpine, with white, fringed 

 flowers, of easy culture and pleasant habit. 



Of vaginatus, the true fiery Holtzeri, of Requieni, 

 Seguieri and many others, I only have seedlings at 

 present, so that my utterances would only be those of 

 hope, not those of experience, and what they might thus 

 gain in radiance they would lose in authority. I have 

 also had, my catalogue tells me, a hybrid of alpinus and 

 callizonus. I cannot even remember it; evidently the 

 plant shared the constitution of its father. Dianthus 

 roseus, that was once sent me, is quite falsely named, but 

 is a pretty, small plant, with glaucous tufts and white 

 flowers : and Spencer Bickham is a bright caesius hybrid. 



Among my other obscure or doubtful pinks stands a 

 very interesting one that I collected at St. Martin 

 Vesubie, and which, in my own mind, for lack of 

 authoritative name, I think of as serotinus. For the 

 merit of this plant is that it sends up its long wiry strag- 

 gling boughs in October, and opens its great fringy 

 flowers in November. These are of a brilliant carmine- 

 magenta, and glow like sparks amid the deadness of the 

 garden. For the plant, easy and robust under cultiva- 

 tion, faithfully retains its late-blooming habit, despite 

 all temptations of changed season and climate. Very 

 lovely too is another vigorous novelty, no less easy and 

 even more striking. This is a hybrid of caesius and 

 svperbus, which makes a tiny bush, clothed all the 

 summer through with innumerable jagged flowers of a 

 rich warm rose. This has the merits of its parents, and 

 is invaluable, — the best, after alpinus and neglectus. 



Lychnis has but one exception to the rule of ugliness 

 that taints its colours. In almost all Lychnises (and 

 pink Silenes too) there is a tang of magenta which very 



