A GARDEN NOTE-BOOK 



brilliance of this lilac in sun I have no adequate 

 words. As for the species lilacs, S. pubescens, which 

 when grown is like a tree of pale heliotrope, with 

 a delicate fragrance unlike that of any lilac ever 

 known; *S. villosa, with its loose pale-pink flowers 

 (never shall I forget my first sight of this, cut with 

 the pale-pearly 7m florentina or iris Storm King) ; 

 and S. macrostachya, one of the most enchanting 

 of aU, very pinkish — one has to see these in order 

 to realize their beauty. Here I mention only 

 three, but there are many others; and the collect- 

 ing and comparing of such subjects is well worth 

 the endeavor of many years of a gardener's life. 

 It happens that my lilacs are placed only four feet 

 apart in the rows where they stand; and I am now 

 in that painful condition of mind of wishing I 

 could in some way keep them back; for such rounds 

 of bloom, such fascinating little flower-covered 

 shrubs, there can hardly be in any other genus. 



I remember a suggestive sentence of Professor 

 Sargent's: "The person who first arranges a fine 

 border of the newer shrubs with regard to color 

 and succession of bloom, will have done a great 

 thing for horticulture in America." How simple 

 this would be in lilacs, if one only lived near the 

 great Arboretum, or that amazingly fine collection 



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