168 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



ground was quite dry, for the season was the end of June ; and by August 

 in a hot summer it will be as dry as a Surrey heath. Yet there 

 were scarcely any rocks, and the moral is that these Anemones, having 

 grown there from seed, could endure any amount of drought in the 

 summer because they had been well- watered in the spring. From this I 

 infer— and I think experience bears me out— that our first care should be 

 to encourage vigorous growth in the more difficult alpines by careful 

 watering in the spring. Until they are thoroughly established they must 

 of course have care at all times. But when they are established and 

 have grown well in the spring, they will endure a good deal of drought in 

 the later part of the year. 



It is in winter and spring that our climate differs most from the 

 climate of the Alps ; and whatever we do we cannot altogether overcome 

 the difference. We must therefore always bear it in mind when we try 

 to learn anything about the culture of alpine plants in England from 

 observing them wild in Switzerland. In particular we must not suppose 

 that a plant which thrives without rocks in Switzerland will do so in 

 England, or that natural arrangements of rock will always serve as a 

 model for rock work in our gardens. 



In the higher valleys of the Alps you will often find the whole ground 

 carpeted with alpine flowers, as if they were daisies and buttercups in an 

 English meadow and with scarcely a rock among them. You will find 

 Gentiana verna and Silene acaulis making a flowery turf together ; 

 with Viola calcarata, Androsace obtusifolia, Primula farinosa, Hutchin- 

 sia alpina, Ranunculus pyrenaeus, and Pinguicula vulgaris and alpina. 

 It is sights such as this that tempt one to wild dreams of making the 

 same kind of flowery turf in England. But it cannot be done ; at least 

 not in Surrey. With us Silene acaulis will not grow in the same spot 

 as Primula farinosa, nor will Androsace obtusifolia flourish with the 

 Pinguiculas. These high valleys suit all kinds of Alpine flowers, except 

 the highest and most difficult, because they are frozen hard and covered 

 with snow all the winter, while they are moist with melting snows 

 almost until the snows fall again. Thus the plants in them need no 

 rocks to protect them either from stagnant moisture in the dead months 

 of the year or from drought when they are growing ; and the conditions 

 suit them all alike, whether they cannot endure stagnant moisture in 

 winter or drought in summer. But we cannot give them such condi- 

 tions ; and the best we can do is to learn the peculiar weakness of each 

 plant and make what provision we can for them. We cannot make a 

 flowery turf of all these alpine plants in a valley without rocks ; because 

 in such a place we cannot have freedom both from stagnant moisture in 

 winter and from drought in summer. We must therefore plan our 

 alpine gardens with a great variety of aspects and with carefully built 

 rock work, so that we may suit the needs of each particular plant. 



There is nothing in the Alps so likely to mislead an inexperienced 

 enthusiast as the arrangement, or want of arrangement, of the rocks. 

 Some of the ugliest and most desolate rock gardens in this country are 

 attempts to imitate the savage chaos of alpine boulders, •which is supposed 

 to be favourable to plant life, because some difficult alpines are to be 

 found growing in it at an elevation of 9,000 feet. Now we in our gardens 



