THE MOUNTAIN BOG 235 



its wee brother, scotica — not to mention its other relatives, 

 magellanica, haku^anensis, algida ; siJekimensis, tall and 

 royal, powdery-white, with swaying peals of sulphur- 

 yellow bells ; and glutinosa with queer crowded little 

 bunches of blue-violet flowers, which it can only be in- 

 duced to put forth when grown in the mossiest, spongiest 

 bog. Finally there are the giants of the denticulata and 

 cashmeriana kinds — fat cabbages for outlying shady 

 banks, and the new pulverulenta form of japonica, with 

 its offspring, the flaming hybrid Unique, whose other 

 parent is cockburniana, and his constitution poor. 



Then there are the North American cousins of Primula 

 — the Shooting Stars, which love rich, well-drained, damp 

 soil. Who the Twelve Gods may be, and what claim 

 they may have to Dodecatheon I cannot tell, but these 

 flowers of the Twelve Gods are gracious if not dazzling 

 creatures, large leaved, with tall stems that carry a head 

 of little purplish, gold-pointed flowers like small Cycla- 

 mens. Their colour is not very interesting, and their 

 growth a trifle gawky ; Meadia is the largest, and has 

 better-coloured varieties ; paudflorum is quite the best 

 kind, a free seeder, smaller than Meadia and excellent for 

 the bog, a most attractive fair frail beauty. 



But the rarest species of all — and indeed the only 

 Alpine species that the twelve undiscerning gods 

 possess, is Dodecatheon integrifolivm. This, however, is 

 a rare, difficult little plant, an Alpine of Alpines, requir- 

 ing a very choice open space in the bog, with abundance 

 of stone chips and fine peaty humus. It only grows 

 three or four inches high, with three or four flowers in a 

 loose cluster at the top of the stem. The blossoms, 

 hardly smaller than those of great stout jeffreyamim and 

 Meadia, look very large for the minute daintiness of the 

 plant; and their colour, though running, like so many 

 tones in this race, towards a magenta-purple, yet have so 



