254 
FLORA AND SYLVA 
rubbish — especially if lime is at all want- 
ing. Once established, all they need is 
an annual dressing of manure, and water 
in a dry season. Pruning often becomes 
a matter of space, where old plants must 
be kept in bounds. The points to re- 
member are, that the spring-flower' ng 
kinds blooming on ripened wood of the 
previous year, must be pruned at once 
after flowering ; the later sorts, flower- 
ing on new wood, should be cut back 
in winter. The weaker kinds may be 
left quite alone and the strong growers 
pay for thinning, and this is especially 
needful in kinds X'^^C .paitictdata which 
flower late and fail unless well ripened. 
In planting be it remembered that poor 
varieties of some kinds such as crispa^ 
flamfnula^ and coccmea abound, and that 
others like gr^ata are not easily found 
true ; a little extra trouble to ensure a 
good form is well repaid. After being 
planted a few years some kinds grow 
bare and do not break from the base un- 
less cut right back — a thing not always 
convenient. This may be avoided by 
planting in pairs,which allows for alter- 
nate hard cutting by which the lower 
stems are kept covered. Some kinds like 
7no7itaiia will make their way anywhere, 
while, if fighting against tree-roots and 
established plants, the less vigorous 
growers should be given a start by sink- 
ing in the ground a bottomless tub of 
good soil. While planting amongstever- 
greens and low trees gives natural and 
charming effect, the support must not 
be too pliable, nor the Clematis so 
trained that wind-waving would injure 
the stems at the base — the point at- 
tacked by fungus. 
I Increase. — This is easy in several 
' ways, though grafting is now the uni- 
versal practice of the trade. Even grafted 
j plants may be eventually had on their 
I own roots, by planting deep and gradu- 
ally earthing round the collar as the 
plants gain a foothold, or by pegging 
down a part of the stems under ground. 
Ripened shoots of almost any kind may 
be layered in this way, and cuttings of 
the young wood taken in late spring or 
early summer and plunged in sand and 
bottom heat, will soon root and grow 
away freely. Most kinds come freely 
from seed and the seedlings grow fast 
and flower in their second year. The 
seed should be sown as soon as possible 
after ripening, either in a cold frame in 
autumn or in gentle heat early in spring. 
C.aethusifolia. — A bushy plant of 4 to 6 feet, 
with slender stems and variable leaves, mostly- 
cut into narrow segments of a pale green colour 
andpretty for decoration. The drooping flowers 
are thimble-shaped and yellowish-white, borne 
singly upon erect stems, and very freely all the 
summer. Mongolia. A variety latisecta from 
N. China, has hairy leaves with segments as 
broad as long which are evenly toothed and 
lobed. 
C.alpina. — A variable and lovely kind. This 
species covers a vast area of mountainous 
country from central Europe to the far East 
and thence to N. -W.America. Its slender ash- 
grey stems of 3 to 6 feet twine upwards in 
early spring, and are naked until from the swol- 
len joints appear leaflets of pale green followed 
closely by the graceful lavender-blue flowers 
fine in colour and form. This is not often 
seen at its best in our gardens but it is charm- 
ing where it does well, left to clamber over a 
fence or an arbour with a north aspect in the 
drier parts of the country. Several distinct 
forms exist ; alba, a Siberian form of stronger 
growth, in which the flowers are almost wholly 
white and 2 to 2^ inches across ; and austriaca, 
a selected form in which the flowers are larger, 
