58 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Here is my selection for such an autumn plant-picture. Those who 

 have not my Scotch Fir backing ready made may well add it, or some 

 substitute for it, some distance in the rear. 



In or towards the rear, a piece of Pinus insignis, of a beautiful 

 bright light green. In every case the planting is, of course, naturally 

 irregular and at uneven distances. Another piece of Pinus pungens 

 glauca, or any other grey-blue or glaucous Pine. Two or three Austrian 

 Pines towards the rear and centre will be less useful to me for their 

 sombre foliage than they would be to others. 



These are the large Conifers in the back half of my picture. Others 

 as good may be added or substituted, such as Pinus Cemhra (the 

 Swiss Stone Pine), Pinus macrocarpa in mild localities, and many 

 others. 



Then (though many of them will need to be felled some day as they 

 become large) there are a few stray bunches of Larch and Birch, with 

 Spruce, a few Liquidambar, a single Maple, one Prunus Pissardi, and some 

 cherry trees of sorts (remember it is tints I am now "collecting"). 

 There is the principal material of — speaking roughly — the back half or 

 thereabouts of my picture. 



A big, low irregular thicket between the Scotch Fir backing and the 

 rest is well worth making out of Brambles, brake Fern, and the like (in 

 order to vary the form of the planting), and covering with Virginia 

 Creepers of differing colours in autumn, with Honeysuckles and the 

 like. 



Towards the centre and foreground it is difficult to find room for the 

 many fine things which lend themselves to massing for splendid autumn 

 colouring. The useful, if hackneyed, Veronica Traversi, in biggish 

 bushes, I use for its light bright green ; Pinus montana, in any of its 

 varieties, for black green contrast. Sea Buckthorn, Arundo Donax, and blue 

 Lyme Grass are planted and grouped on the outskirts, in part to relieve 

 stiffness of the Conifers, in part to contribute grey and glaucous tones. 



And then for the near foreground we have, all splendid in their 

 autumn tints, Bhus Cotinus atropurpureus and Blmis glaher laci?iiatus ; 

 Berheris purpurea, plum- coloured ; B. Thunhergi, orange and flame. 

 Perhaps, taken all round, this last is the finest autumn- tinted shrub we 

 have. And the two species together form perhaps the finest conceivable 

 contrast and conjunction for the season. B. Darioini and B. stenophylla, 

 for their vivid green and spring blossom, may, if there be room, be well 

 added. 



Many Cotoneasters are suitable and may be included in my picture. 

 But at any rate the glorious blood-red foliage of C. horizontalis must not 

 be absent, side by side with the dark as well as light and grey greens of 

 procumbent or spreading Junipers. 



As carpet and undergrowth I have Vacciniums, and the low and creeping 

 shrubby Veronicas of New Zealand (bright green, or grey, or glaucous), 

 and grey Antennarias, and "gullies " of Herniaria glabra and Saxifrage. 



Probably the number of species which I have included may be even 

 too many to yield the best efi'ects unless the area available be very large ; 

 and yet it is not the half of the number, even of "first rates," for our 

 purpose. 



