HERBACEOUS FLOWERS. 



103 



from business, in consequence of the arrival of more 

 attractive and equally serviceable new-comers. One or 

 two Tutsan bushes may be permitted to help to form a 

 screen of shrubs, in consideration of the days of auld 

 lang syne. 



Salvia — Sage. — See " The Kitchen G-arden." — S. sjplen- 

 dens forms a robust tuft that throws up spikes of scarlet 

 flowers ; a showy plant, very useful in autumn ; will sur- 

 vive our winters, but should not remain long on the 

 same spot, and therefore is best divided at the root in 

 autumn, potted, and kept under a frame during winter. 

 S. patens resembles the above "in habit, with brilliant 

 smalt-blue flowers, but must have winter protection. 

 £. nemoralis, hardy, produces a long succession of small 

 amethyst-purple flowers, which have a fine effect when 

 grown in a large mass, or as a hedge, and which are 

 so attractive to bees that the twiggy stems on which they 

 grow sometimes are crowded with numerous species of the 

 genus Apis : there are humble-bees, earth-bees, hive-bees, 

 and others, — queens, drones, and workers, — all swarm- 

 ing together amidst the flower-forest in search of honey. 

 C. coccinea, tender in winter, makes a convenient pot- 

 plant, being in the style of S. splendens, but smaller and 

 slenderer. There are numerous other gaudy species, 

 with blue, pink, white, yellow, red, violet, and two- 

 coloured flowers, in all more than four hundred, the 

 majority not hardy in England. They are raised from 

 seeds, cuttings, and root- division ; like light rich soil, 

 which they speedily exhaust ; and require frequent shift- 

 ing in pots. Old stools of the more showy Salvias, win- 

 tered in a frame, and planted out in May entire, will 

 make magnificent tufts, and furnish a profusion of 

 splendid bloom. 



Saxifrage. — See London Tuft, 



Scabious — Scabiosa atro-purptcrea, and others. Pin- 

 cushion Flower. — "Well-known border plants, which retain 

 their place mainly because we are used to them, and are 

 accustomed to cut their honey-scented blooms to fill up 

 the intervals in large bouquets. Sowing the seeds gives 



