THE GARDEN IN WINTER 



31 



of mud by having moss placed on the earth beneath 

 them. Of the many species and varieties, the old 

 Christmas Rose (i/. niger) is by far the most valuable. 

 Its large white flowers, appearing at the end of the year, 

 when most flowers have succumbed to numbing cold or 

 blighting winds, stir the imagination in the same way 

 as does a beautiful face in the Bow Street dock or a 

 butterfly in a foundry. The so-called Helleborus niger 

 maximus^ or altifolius, has larger flowers, which, 

 moreover, appear earlier than those of H. niger ^ but the 

 colour is not so pure, many of the flowers being tinged 

 with pink. The crimson H. abchasicus^ and H, colchiciis 

 with flowers of darkest purple, as well as some of the 

 hybrids derived from them, should be grown in every 

 garden. The green and inconspicuous flowered varieties, 

 such as H.foetidus, H. lividus, which came from Corsica 

 about the beginning of the eighteenth century, and H. 

 viridus, are well worth growing for their foliage, and 

 indeed for their flowers also, if there be any shady moist 

 corner where few plants will thrive. 



A plant somewhat related to the Hellebores, though 

 smaller in every way, is the pretty little Winter 

 Aconite {Eranthis hyemalis), which brightens the ground 

 early in January with its yellow cups resting on the 

 daintiest of green rufl^es. It looks its best when it has 

 become well established and naturalised in grass, or 

 among trees and shrubs. Long after the flower has 

 fallen, the beautiful foliage continues to drape and deco- 

 rate the earth during the early months of the year. In 

 warm, sheltered situations, two species of Scilla often 

 produce their flowers in January : — Scilla bifolia, which 

 sends up spikes of dark blue bells, the spikes being 

 about eight inches in height, and the much smaller and 

 somewhat later S, siberica, with flowers of peculiarly 

 intense blue. Some of the anemones often begin to 

 flower in winter, especially the Blue Wind-flower of 



