THE WISTARIA SINENSIS. 
135 
plant-houses, is the Wistaria applicable in the open ground, if we except forcing, 
and consider it as a low shrub, instead of a shrub in a pot. 
When grown as a wall-plant, and trained over the face of a house, or other 
erection, the circumstance of its blooming before the leaves are expanded, though 
not in itself an uninteresting one, is a thing which, we think, might properly exercise 
the attention and inquiry of the culturist, in order to associate it with some other 
plant which would supply the verdure that is lacking at this season. It is our 
impression that the Ivy, being the most verdant of all plants with a climbing- 
habitude, might be very suitably blended with the Wistaria in clothing a wall, or 
other building. From the spreading nature of the Ivy, it would necessarily require 
a great deal of trimming and pruning, to prevent it from overrunning the Wistaria^ 
and smothering it. But this matter could be easily attended to ; and if only half- 
a-dozen bunches of bloom were here and there visible among the dark foliage of 
the Ivy, the effect would be most fascinating. 
Perhaps a more proper companion for the Wistaria^ would be the common 
Laburnum, which, blooming nearly at the same time, having an allied character, 
and possessing a greater profusion of bright-green foliage, might be happily 
mingled with it. That the Laburnum is capable of being readily trained against 
a wall, is manifest by the many beautiful specimens which exist on the fronts of 
houses in the neighbourhood of the metropolis. And, by intermixing the branches 
of the two plants in training, their similar racemes of blue and yellow blossoms 
would create a peculiar, yet not unpleasing, contrast. 
In treating the Wistaria as an open ground plant, cultivators have hitherto 
employed it principally against walls and houses ; and its singular adaptation for 
decorating bowers, arbours, &c., seems to have been quite overlooked. It is 
remarkably well fitted for covering those trellised arches of wood or wire which 
are sometimes placed over walks in flower-gardens and parts of pleasure-grounds, 
as nothing could be more enchanting than to walk beneath an arch of its lovely 
blooms. Those open-roofed pavilions or canopies, too, which are occasionally 
made of rustic wood, and put up in similar places, chiefly for sustaining climbers, 
afford an equally good position for our charming Wistaria. 
Arbours, moreover, and the retired erections which are common in some gardens, 
for the purpose of furnishing rest, or cool and quiet enjoyment, could be orna- 
mented with nothing so appropriate, in the way of climbers, as the Wistaria ; for 
to look through its noble racemes of blossoms, fringing the edge of the roof, or 
surrounding the pillars along the front, would constitute the perfection of a fore- 
ground to a scene either of rural beauty or of enriched and elaborate cultivation. 
In regard to the hardihood of the Wistaria^ we may observe that, because its 
early blossoms, when opening on a southern wall, sometimes need, or appear to 
need, protection from the easterly winds or late frosts of spring, the plant has been 
considered as partially tender. There is a mistake here, however, arising from the 
circumstances peculiar to such positions. On a southern wall, the flowers of this 
