88 



SELECT PLANTS READILY ELIGIBLE 



Festuca ovina, Linne. 



Sheep-Fescue. Europe, Nortli and Middle Asia, North 

 America, found also in South America and the Alps of 

 Australia and New Zealand. This species like F. elatior is 

 obtainable with facility. F. duriuscula, L., and F. rubra, L., 

 are varieties. A perennial grass, thriving on widely different 

 soil, even moory and sandy gi'ound. It yields a good produce, 

 maintains its virtue, resists drought and is also well adapted 

 for lawns and the swards of parks. 



Festuca purpurea, F. v. Mueller. (Uraleins purpurea^ 

 Nuttall ; Tricicspis jjurpm^ea, A. Gray. 

 South-East coast of North America. A tufty sand-grass, 

 but annual. 



Festuca silvatica, Yillars. 



Middle and South Europe. A notable forest-grass. F. 

 drymeia (Mert. and Koch), a grass with long creeping roots, 

 is closely allied. Both deserve here test culture. 



Festuca spadicea, Linne. 



Alps of Europe. This grass would thrive on the heights of 

 our snowy mountains. Perennial. 

 The space does not admit of entering here into further 

 details of the respective value of many species of Festuca 

 which might advantageously be introduced from various parts 

 of the globe for rural purposes. 



Ficus Carica, Linne. 



Orient. The ordinary Fig-tree. It attains an age of several 

 hundred years. In our latitudes and clime a prolific tree. 

 The most useful and at the same time the most hardy of 

 half-a-thousand recorded species of Ficus. The extreme 

 facility with which it can be propagated from cuttings, the 

 resistance to heat, the comparatively early yield and easy 

 culture recommend the Fig-tree to be chosen, where it is an 

 object to raise masses of tree- vegetation in widely treeless 

 landscapes of the warmer zones. Hence the extensive 

 plantations of this tree, made in formerly woodless parts of 

 Egypt; hence the likelihood of choosing the Fig as one of 

 the trees for extensive planting through favourable portions 

 of our desert-wastes, where moreover the fruit could be dried 

 with particular ease. Caprification is unnecessary, even in 

 some instances injurious and objectionable. Two main- 

 varieties may be distinguished, that which produces two 

 crops a year and that which yields but one. The former in- 

 cludes the grey or purple Fig, which is the best, the white 

 Fig and the golden Fig, the latter being the finest in appear- 

 ance but not in quality. The main variety, which bears only 



