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The Garden Magazine, October, 1921 



EARLIEST SPRINGTIME 



Snowdrops planted in a natural manner in grass at the foot of a tree. Often 

 they show their flowers while the snow yet lingers and mark the earliest days 

 of outdoor gardening. A hundred or so bulbs are shown in the planting 



fill the role of bedders, that they are seldom seen in any other 

 position. Nevertheless they are perfectly at home and look the 

 part when planted in irregular drifts along the edge of shrub- 

 bery, or in the hardy border, in conjunction with such other 

 spring flowering plants as Myosotis, English Daisies, Pansies, 

 Wallflowers, Arabis, Aubretia, etc. Even the geometrical bed- 

 ding out of Hyacinths may be made much less stiff and formal 

 if the bulbs be placed nine inches apart, and the space between 

 filled with spring flowering plants that bloom at the same time. 

 A bed of pink Hyacinths and blue Forget-me-nots has something 

 more than the commonplace about it. Or dark blue Hyacinths 

 and pink English Daisies, white Hyacinths with Forget-me-nots, 

 light blue with golden Alyssum, yellow Hyacinths with purple 

 Pansies, are particularly happy combinations. 



NOTHING can equal in brilliancy or richness of color a bed 

 or border planted with a mass of gorgeous Tulips, show- 

 ing their full beauty during April, and onward into June. It 



is one of the most striking in the whole host of garden attrac- 

 tions. The single Early Tulips have a charm all their own, 

 which is accentuated when they are used to outline the quaint 

 patterns of beds and borders or to fill with color the squares, 

 circles, and crescents cut in green turf, if such be the style of 

 bedding fancied. 



Variety may be added by including some of the double early 

 flowering varieties in the more exposed parts of the garden for 

 which the later flowering and taller varieties are unsuitable. 



The aristocrats of the Tulip family, however, are the May- 

 flowering kinds which include the Darwins, Breeders, and Cot- 

 tage types. There is considerable difference in the general 

 appearance and habit of these groups. The Darwins are dis- 

 tinguished for the beautiful blendings of several nearly related 

 color tones; rose, lilac, lavender, heliotrope, gray-violet, and 

 scarlet being most predominant. Yellows are entirely absent. 

 The stems are tall and strong and the flowers cup-shaped, or 

 globular and of fine substance. 



The flowers of the Cottage section are long and slender, the 

 segments narrow, often pointed, and reflexed. Stems are 

 long, slender, and willowy. Their general effect is as distinctly 

 informal, as that of the Early Tulips is conventional and prim. 

 Their pure clean color is a conspicuous quality, running from 



THE PERVASIVE FRAGRANCE OF THE HYACINTH 



Usually employed in formal effects because of a certain inherent 

 stiff formality of its own, the Hyacinth yet lends itself to com- 

 bination in the border if planted in irregular mass. Its penetrat- 

 ing, sweet fragrance is a quality not to be forgotten or ignored 



