CHAPTER XI 



THE CLEMATIS AS A CLIMBER 



Its Beauty — The Species — Prolonged Period of Bloom — Disease — 

 Shading Stems — Preparation of Soil — Training and Pruning — 

 Propagation — Under Glass. 



The Clematis forms such an admirable ornament to our 

 gardens, and is so popular among all who have a love 

 for climbing plants, that a greater space may be devoted 

 to the flower and its requirements than is generally given 

 to other genera in this work. It is so varied in its char- 

 acter that it adapts itself readily to many decorative 

 effects, and in almost all its forms is so beautiful that 

 few gardens seem as if they were incapable of improve- 

 ment when this flower is absent from its walls and its 

 trees. It gives us clouds of small flowers and masses 

 of foliage to trail up a tree or a wall ; it gives us masses 

 of bright flowers of great beauty on less vigorous 

 growth, or it yields us large and perfect single or 

 double flowers of the highest beauty. The Clematis 

 may be used alike on the wall, the trellis, the arch, the 

 pergola, or clambering up a tree. 



While it must be said that much of the popularity of 

 the Clematis and its free use are due to the many ex- 

 quisite hybrids which have been introduced from time 

 to time, there are many beautiful species of which little 

 is known by the great number of growers of these 

 flowers, which would well repay the cultivator and 

 which are destined to give us through the skill of the 

 hybridiser flowers of a character yet undreamt of. If 



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