THE GREATER BOG-PLANTS 179 



the manner of Spiraea Aruncus. As a water-side plant 

 Seneclo clivorum quite extinguishes its other big robust 

 cousins, the Ligularias, fine dock-leaved things, with 

 tall spires of uninteresting, stodgy yellow. 



Senecio thianshanicus is another new introduction, also 

 from Upper China. For this I have so far but little use. 

 Its growth and leafage is that of a Wormwood, and its 

 inflorescence cloudy and loose, made up of innumerable 

 minute flowers, reminds me of a Golden-rod — a thing I 

 hate — or else of a yellow Spiraea. Also it seems to run 

 about and form a colony. Late summer and autumn 

 sees these stout Groundsels in their prime, but when they 

 are going to rest they are followed, in late October, 

 November, and December, by the insolent, dreadful glory 

 of Senecio pulcher. The beautiful Senecio hails from 

 Mexico, a smallish plant by comparison with its giant 

 kindred, growing to two feet or a little more, with 

 spatulate basal leaves of glaucous blue-grey, leathery and 

 smooth, and then, on a bare stem, three or four large 

 flowers of a blazing magenta-purple, eyed with gold. In 

 dull dead days, the fire of this is wonderful in rare 

 glimpses of the pale sunlight, and the plant has thus an 

 artificial value besides that of its own intrinsic splendour. 

 But this unexpectedly hardy exotic is not, after all, of 

 perfectly unquestioned hardiness. And it is by no means a 

 plant for the bog. On the contrary, it detests superfluous 

 moisture, and must have, to do itself justice and be 

 permanent, a warm, sheltered, sunny corner well up on 

 the rock-work, in very deep rich soil, warm and light, 

 through which its vast vermicelli roots may go roaming 

 untroubled by corroding damps. 



Let us now deal compendiously with the other Ground- 

 sels, since among them we are landed, leaping away for 

 a moment from the low-lying territory of the bog. And 

 a far leap it is, too ; away through the clear air to the 



