THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 
149 
THE GOETHE PLANT. 
Y I be allowed to draw the attention of your town 
readers to a very interesting and graceful plant, that 
has now for some years past been much employed for 
indoor decoration in Germany, and which is at present 
beginning to attract the attention of English amateurs. 
I mean the Clorophytum Sternlergianum, or Goethe Plant as it is 
called on the Continent. 
A description is given of it by Goethe in a letter dated Weimar, 
1828, which is quoted by Miss Hope in a most interesting article in 
the Gardener’s Chronicle of January 11th, 1873, to which I beg to 
refer your more scientific readers. 
Goethe says he found it in the Grand Ducal Gardens at Bel- 
vedere near Weimar; but it seems to have been first described by 
Count Sternberg, after whom it receives its name. 
It is an Anthericum, and therefore of the lily tribe, and is 
supposed to be a native of the Cape of Good Hope. 
In appearance it is a graceful, grassy-looking plant, not unlike 
in foliage to the Day Lily, though on a much smaller scale. A large 
plant of it would be perhaps best described by imagining tufts of the 
common wild ribbon-grass strung together at intervals of a foot apart 
between the tufts. These hanging down, and trailing in all directions, 
make a tangle of a lovely, soft green that is most refreshing to eyes 
wearied with the heat and dust of a London summer. A drawing is 
published with the above-named article, taken from a photograph 
of the plant in Miss Hope’s possession, but it gives no idea of 
the great beauty of the Clorophytum Sternbergianum when it has 
attained itsfull growth and vigour, and is reallya good specimen plant. 
It grows in the way of strawberries and the Saxifraga sarmentosa, 
viz., a parent plant with an endless number of runners, these in 
their turn having offshoots again springing out of them. The finest 
specimen I have ever seen was placed in the corner of a drawing- 
room in Germany, and drooped over a wire stand of about four feet 
high ; the parent plant stood in a good-sized pot on the topmost 
tier of the stand, all of which was quite hidden by the green cascade 
of plantlets trailing to the floor. The effect of the whole, with its 
small, feathery blossoms, was extremely beautiful. Now, the great 
advantage of the Goethe Plant to amateurs lies in the fact that 
it flourishes with very little light, and really seems to prefjr want of 
air; in fact, most people kill their plants by putting them out in the 
wind. Mine throve admirably in London till 'put oui ; it was 
originally a little offset given me in Germany by the lady who 
owned the large plant just mentioned, and it had cheerfully travelled 
about with me for weeks, with an occasional airing, just wrapped in 
a piece of damp flannel. When at last it arrived in town, though 
the outer leaves were damping off and it looked suspicious about the 
crown ; still it was not dead, and when gently planted in a mixture 
of leaf-mould and sandy loam it soon picked up its looks. At first 
it was kept rather dry till it was established and showed unmistak- 
May. 
