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JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Such a position has been chosen in our place, and here a numerous 

 family party are established and look the picture of happy well-being. 

 At times, its fancy is to grow in a patch on some sunny bit of lawn where 

 a big tree may keep the grass spare and dry. I have enjoyed the sight of 

 our little plant on the wall all through March and part of April. But 

 towards the end of that month it will have grown too tall and scraggy. 

 It will look gigantic, towering above a new settlement of Forget-me-nots 

 which have taken possession of the moss-grown ledge, crowding over every 

 inch around the Draba roots. These Forget-me-nots are the most wonder- 

 ful lilliputians imaginable. Each flower is almost smaller than the head of 

 the very tiniest minikin pin ; yet the six square inches of them gathered 

 together give a perceptible sense of blue to the bit of old wall. The sky- 

 blue is as bright and the starry form as perfect in every detail, as in any 

 of those finer forms of Forget-me-not that set with turquoise the wild 

 margin of an English river. 



Robin-run-the-hedge, or Goose-grass (Galium Aparine, Cleavers), is 

 as tiresome as any of our most unbeloved garden weeds. It begins early, 

 and if let alone would soon smother up everything. The Greeks, I believe, 

 called Goose-grass Philanthropon, because they attributed to a love of 

 mankind its tiresome clinging habit. If this were true, our remorseless 

 pulling up of it would indeed seem hard. A much smaller, more refined 

 Goose grass grows in one — and only in one — little bit of shrubbery 

 amongst Ivy and Kcrria and Bramble. This may be Galium tricorne 

 (though it answers not in the least to Anne Pratt's description). It never 

 wanders, and makes a pretty variety mixing with the dark- leaved Ivy. 



White Bryony (Bryonia dioica) is springing fast in May, already 

 seeking to support itself on Yew hedges, Box, or Laurel. The small green 

 flower comes much later, with all its furnishment of most sentient, most 

 intelligent tendrils. Y'ou may almost think you sec them, stretching out 

 like hands to clasp and hold a branch or stick or aught else likely to 

 support the tender shoots. I do not know if ever the question has been 

 decided whether these tendrils twist always from right to left or the 

 other way. Once I made a series of observations ; but that is so long ago 

 I forget the result, if any ; and it does not matter much. We give our 

 White Bryony leave to clamber where it will ; nor is it torn down until 

 the green round berry begins to redden, when, having lost self-control, 

 the plant has lost its charm. 



Black Bryony (Tamus communis) is rare in our countryside, and we 

 have within the garden only two. These two plants are cared for and 

 cherished, for Black Bryony is handsomer than White. The Black has 

 no tendrils, yet it manages well enough without ; and as for its leaf, I 

 know no other leaf so satisfying to the eye as this, in the plain sincerity 

 of its pure outline. 



Another climber which I think is native to all gardens in every place 

 everywhere — the fatal Bindweed, or withy-wind — would strangle in an 

 unrelenting weak embrace the entire pride of the garden. Only an 

 unsparing vigilance will keep the beautiful destroyer in check. Yet, for 

 me at least, what courage is needed to tear away a thing so utterly lovely 

 as the snow-white Convolvulus-flower of it is ! Once I asked my gardener, 

 '• Was there any place at all where Bindweed might be in peace, and 



