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THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA. 
THE FEATHER HYACINTH. 
TT is pretty safe to say that even among gardeners six 
seven out of even- ten persons could not name the 
Feather Hyacinth if shown one of its feathery inflor- 
escences in the spring time. It may be urged that if this 
is so, then, being so little known, the plant cannot be of 
much worth in the garden. This argument would hold 
good if beauty depended entirely upon brilliant colouring 
and popularity, But such is not the case. 
.Many crocus species, grown in little nooks in the Rock 
Garden, are fully as beautiful as the commoner forms 
used for spring bedding, and so Muscari comosum mon- 
strosum has a quiet beauty and special grace of its own. 
and is a useful plant for the Rock Garden or for the nar- 
row borders so often found beneath house windows or 
alongside greenhouses. 
i 
The Feather Hyacinth. 
My first acquaintance with it, writes T. H. Ames in 
The Gardener's Magazine (English) was made nearly 
thirty years ago, in a Surrey garden, where a number of 
bulbs had been planted in a very narrow border below the 
bay window of the gardener's house. The youthful en- 
thusiasm roused by the heads of soft bluish-violet flowers, 
and the "inflorescence transformed into a dense tuft of 
slender ramifications" has not wholly abated with the 
passing of the years and a wider knowledge of plants. I 
must confess that the old plant — introduced in 1596 — 
does not occupy a very dignified place in my own garden, 
but a small group of bulbs produces spikes year after 
year near the margin of a herbaceous border and ungen- 
erous treatment, which would have banished many an- 
other bulb, seems not to affect it at all. Half a dozen 
spikes in a small vase invariably draw interesting com- 
ments from visitors, and many non-horticultural friends 
have concluded that the spikes represent some rare or- 
chid, and it is difficult to convince them otherwise until 
I show them the growing plants. 
Many deserving species of Muscari have been neglected 
since M. conicum Heavenly Blue burst into pupularity, 
but, perhaps, the shortage of Dutch bulbs may cause 
them to be cultivated, and then the Feather Hyacinth will 
certainly occupy a higher position than it does at the pres- 
ent time. 
THE FIG-LEAVED HOLLYHOCK 
(Althaea Figifolia) 
HP HE single yellow Fig-leaved Hollyhock is certainly 
one of the most beautiful of its race. Many prefer 
the single forms to the monstrously doubled florists' va- 
rieties now usually met with in gardens, which entirely 
lack the grace of contour exhibited by the blossoms still 
to be found in some cottage gardens, which have centres 
of curving petals not too closely doubled and clear guard 
petals. Of the singles, Althaea ficifolia is to be preferred 
to any, its flowers, of exquisite shape, being of a delight- 
ful clear pale-yellow color, and the plant is well worthy 
of inclusion in the best herbaceous border. The blossoms 
are from 3 inches to 4 inches across, of delicate texture 
and very refined in appearance. The leaves are large, 
palmate and divided into from five to seven lobes, and 
somewhat resemble those of a Fig tree. From shortly 
after midsummer until the late autumn this Hollyhock 
creates a charming picture in the garden, its towering 
stems, 8 feet and more in height, being studded with 
clear-colored blossoms. Many aver that the Hollyhock 
should be treated as an annual, and that it is useless to 
retain old plants ; but this particular specimen has now 
occupied its position for over five years, and annually 
throws up flower-stems that show no sign of decreasing 
vigor. It is also, apparently, not so susceptible to the 
dreaded Hollyhock disease as most of its family ; for the 
plant in question has never shown the slightest symptom 
of it, though it must be said that no other Hollyhocks 
The Fig-Leaved Hollyhock 
are grown in the same garden. Every year self-sown 
seedlings appear around the parent plant, numbers of 
which have been given away to those who did not possess 
the plant. A. ficifolia is a native of Siberia, whence it 
was introduced into this country more than three hun- 
dred years ago. — The Garden ( English ). 
