FLOWERS. 



127 



which produces clusters of white fruit in autumn, and is 

 oniamental. Propagated best by suckers. 



Spice-wood — Laurus benzoin — is a very fragrant shrub, 

 of medicinal virtues. It grows best in the shade, and 

 surnetimes bears a long, green, spicy fruit. It is propagated 

 by suckers. 



SiMDE.ivYORT — Tradescautia — is a singular perennial plant, 

 which is in bloom for a long time. The blue is more ad- 

 mired than the white. It requires a light covering dnrmg 

 the severity of winter ; and is propagated by dividing the 

 roots. 



SpiRiEA. — This is a small shrub, loaded with delicate 

 flowers in the season of its blooming. Propagated by 

 suckers. • 



Syuinga, or Mock orange. — A shrub, which has flowers 

 much like those of the orange. It makes a prelly appear- 

 ance with other shrubbery. Propagated by suckers. 



Strawberry tree — Euonymus — is a very handsome 

 shrub, producing, in autumn, an abundance of fruit, some- 

 what resembling the strawberry. The European is pre- 

 ferred to the American. It has been called the burning 

 bush^ from its appearance when loaded with ripe fruit. It 

 is propagated by seed and by suckers. 



Sweet bay — Laurus nobilis — is a very pretty evergreen 

 shrub, well calculated to stand (in a large pot) in the par- 

 lour during winter. Propagated by suckers. 



Sweet William, or Poetic viNK—Dianthus barbatus — is 

 an imperfect perennial, producing very handsome flowers of 

 small size. It is propagated by seed, the plants of which 

 do not produce flowers like those of the parent plant, ex- 

 cept by chance. It may be propagated by dividing the 

 roots. 



Tulip. — Tulipa. — In no family of plants has Nature so 

 varied her delicate tints as in this. There are more than 

 six hundred varieties of this splendid flower cultivated in 

 the Linniean Garden on Lonp^ Island. During the tulip 

 fever, which raged in Holland, about the middle of the 

 seventeenth century, some splendid varieties were sold for 

 enormous sums of money ; one of which, called the vice- 

 roi^ brouprht ten thousand dollars. 



The tulip may be raised from seed ; but it is, as in the 

 case of the auricula, mere chance if one be obtained, that 

 w^ill produce flowers like those of the parent plant. They 

 are best propagated by the bulbs. 



There is something respecting thi« plant astonishing. 



