THE CULTIVATION OF HARDY FLOWERS. 449 



they have been planted as single shoots in the previous spring 

 or autumn. All this must be learnt by practice. As for plants 

 of running habit, they should be avoided in mixed borders. It 

 is ruin to most of them to try to keep them in bounds by cutting 

 round, as by this all the best flowering shoots are cut off. I 

 have tried confining them by underground earthenware hoops, or 

 within boards, without much success. Therefore such subjects 

 as Helianthus rigidus and Anemone japonica, which few of us 

 can do without, must have special arrangements made for them ; 

 but, however they are treated, it is better to keep them in full 

 view, where they can be under constant control, and to assign 

 to them a sufficient breadth of soil to prevent their soon ex- 

 hausting it. 



Another question which occurs in selecting occupants for 

 a permanent border, expected to last for years, is that of 

 hardiness. This is, of course, a relative term, and there can be 

 no absolute standard fixed. Some plants which are called hardy 

 may withstand perhaps twenty, perhaps thirty degrees of frost; 

 their power of withstanding depends upon a combination of 

 surrounding conditions and attendant circumstances. What we 

 want to know, and it must be learnt chiefly by our own experi- 

 ence, is the relative hardiness of each plant in our own garden. 

 Many a plant is well worth growing which is killed once in five, 

 or even once in three years, but such plants should not occupy 

 positions so prominent that their death would leave a conspicuous 

 gap. A hardy plant may even require annual renewal by cuttings, 

 to be wintered under glass, and be quite worth the trouble. 

 Other perennials seem soon to lose their power of breaking in 

 spring from the hard or woody base, and are lost if not renewed 

 by seed or cuttings about every third year. Such are Hyperi- 

 cum olympicum, Ononis rotundifolia, Gypsophila paniculata, &c. 

 When we have once lost all our stock of a good plant we should 

 consider by what precautions we might have saved it, and take 

 them another time. Perennial does not mean everlasting or 

 immortal, as some cultivators seem to think. As soon as a new 

 plant is obtained, our next thought should be how to increase it ; 

 when we have succeeded in this, we should try what soil, what 

 aspect and surroundings suit it best. Without neglecting what 

 you can learn from others about its successful cultivation, try 

 yourself to discover something new in this way. Gardeners 



