Gardening Suggestions, by Veronica" — II. 



THE SUBTLE SURPRISES OF GARDENING - HOW THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES OF MEN MAY "GANG 

 AGLEY" BUT ARE SUPPLANTED BY OTHERS OF NATURE THAT YIELD UNLOOKED-FOR BEAUTY 



[Editor's Note. — The former article, dealing with edgings, appeared in the February number.} 



\ \ 7 HAT was your greatest success latt 

 * " year, and what were the best gar- 

 den pictures you saw? The amusing tiling 

 about gardening is the unexpectedness of 

 it — the way things turn out, in spite of all 

 one's planning. After expecting to have 

 my best effect a combination of fifty red 

 hollyhocks and a mass of Shirley pop- 

 pies, I was very much surprised to find that 

 some white phloxes in three varieties and 

 Honorine Joubert Japanese anemones made 

 my most lovely pictures. They had both 

 been planted three years. After peonies, 

 hollyhocks, delphiniums and phloxes,. they 

 are surely the loveliest perennials, and unless 

 the first-mentioned are the best of their kind, 

 Honorine beats them all. The dark Japanese 

 anemone is not nearly so good, but Queen 

 Charlotte mixed with gray grasses gives a 

 lovely effect of silvery pink. The annual 

 verbena makes an excellent foreground for 

 the tall anemones. 



To go back to my phloxes, they are the 

 wonderful Fraulein Von Lassberg, which is 

 very much larger than any phlox I ever saw, 

 and, unlike some of the new, big-flowered 

 ones, it is also fairly tall. The other two 

 kinds are older and commoner white 

 ones — Anna Crozy and Jeanne d'Arc — 

 and just as Anna begins to lose her freshness 



Annual verbena fronts the Japanese anemone 



Jeanne comes out, so I plant them mixed for 

 a succession, cutting off any heads that may 

 become shabby. One stem of Jeanne d'Arc 

 measured six feet because it was struggling 

 to the light among tall boltonias. These 

 phloxes are never so good after three years, 

 as they exhaust the soil and want dividing 

 and replanting. Phloxes increase so fast 

 in rich soil and are so easy to raise from seed 

 that it is a mistake to keep the ugly magenta 

 ones in a garden. In the first place they are 

 bound to swear with everything (though 

 worst of all with Golden Glow), and they will 

 spoil your seed, as the bees mix the magenta 

 seed with the seed of fine phloxes. Planted 

 in open woods, however, they are charming, 

 and they can perfectly well be moved when 



in bloom, though gardeners deny this. I've 

 moved dozens when in bloom, and never lost 

 one. They must, of course, be well watered, 

 both before and after moving, and not be kept 

 out of the ground long. All transplanting is 

 best done in gray, showery weather, and in 

 midsummer this is doubly important. 



I once arrived at a hired house at the end of 

 July, and found a woefully bare garden. 

 The cottage gardens were filled with phloxes 

 just showing color, and for a few shillings I 

 got a fine display and brought them home in 

 the carriage. This was in England, but the 

 same can be done here, especially with hardy 

 chrysanthemums, which are so easy to move. 



The accompanying photographs show the 

 same lot of phloxes looking from the north 

 and from the south, and the oak in the fore- 

 ground, with a small grape vine climbing up 

 it, is the same in each picture. The stocks 

 in front of the phloxes are the pale pink cut- 

 and-come-again, and were marvelously gen- 

 erous, for they stayed in bloom for months, 

 and made a charming effect on the warm days 

 of a wonderful November. In front of them 

 are Saponaria ocymoides and (Enolhera spec- 

 iosa, both beautiful pink things to hang over 

 gray stones, the former in May, the latter in 

 June, when they made a charming harmony 

 with pink Canterbury bells and foxgloves. 



These pictures show the same walk from opposite directions. White phloxes and Japanese anemones made the 



173 



unexpect 



