298 
THE CULTURE OF HARDY PERENNIALS. 
parcel of the tree, the rest of the stock being 
cut away, and the portion that is left being 
prevented from growing. Standards are 
sometimes budded four, five, and six feet 
from the ground ; but many prefer even the 
trunk, growing from the eye, instead of being 
formed of the stock. 
The destruction of vermin is, at this time, 
a most important task. ^Vasps and ants, ear- 
wigs, snails, slugs, &c,, wage destructive war 
against early fruit, and, unless well Hooked 
after and destroyed, scarcely an undamaged 
fruit will be obtained. For snails, sings, and 
earwigs, there is nothing so effective as watch- 
ing for them mornings, evenings, and wet 
days. "Wasps and ants must be trapped in 
wide-mouthed bottles, with a little beer and 
sugar on the bottom, or say it is one-third 
\ filled. By frequently watching these, and 
I clearing them out, thousands may be caught. 
THE CULTURE OF HARDY PERENNIALS. 
These may be divided into two classes, her- 
baceous perennials, and shrubby perennials, the 
former dying down every season, and springing 
up again, the other maintaining their shrubby 
form all the year. Among the former may be 
included all perennial bulbs, and many tuber- 
ous-rooted subjects, nearly the whole of 
which increase of themselves, and among the 
latter those which are chiefly propagated from 
cuttings, seeds, layers, slips, &c. The herbaceous 
perennials may again be divided into bulbous, 
tuberous, and fibrous. The first may be taken 
up every year, the second may be left for a 
time, and occasionally parted, and the last will 
keep spreading to a great size, but should be 
always kept within moderate bounds, accord- 
ing to the station they are to fill. The first 
sort includes nearly all the popular hardy 
bulbs, Lilies, Crocuses, Tulips, Gladioli, Hya- 
cinths, Narcissi, &c. all of which require 
nothing but a good border of loam and leaf- 
mould, to be planted in November, and be 
taken up wdien the leaf dies down, or, if it be 
wished for them to spread more, to be left 
another season. The tuberous kinds, com- 
prise a large family, the Pa3onies, Irises, 
Aconites, Anemones, Ranunculuses, and such 
like ; and the last, the Phloxes, Lychnises, 
Pentstemons, Perennial-asters, Lupines, &c. 
But the roots rather dictate the mode of in- 
crease, than affect the apparent nature of the 
herbaceous perennials. They all shoot up in 
the spring, perform their offices of flowering, 
and perhaps seeding, and then die down to the 
ground. When it is intended to plant a 
border of herbaceous perennials, some attention 
must be paid to the height and colour, as well 
as the season of bloom. Some of them grow 
a yard or more in height, and they vary from 
that down to a few inches. All the' tallest 
should be at the back, be their season of 
bloom when it may, and it is better to have 
few varieties, well selected, to keep up a diver- 
sity of bloom each month, than to aim at a 
great variety, and involve inconsistency in the 
plan ; for instance, it would be better to see 
in a long border a dozen plants of the same 
thing in flower at equal distances, than it 
would to see one or two, because one or two 
would give no feature. Suppose, then, we 
calculate on certain things which in their 
season make a great show, say the scarlet 
Lychnis and the white, both occupying an in- 
termediate space between the back and front 
of the border. Here are scarlet and white. 
For blue we will say, Campanula pyramidalis, 
which should be rather more backward, and 
Delphinium grandiflorum. Some of the Phloxes 
would also come in among the latter kinds of 
plants, and diversify the colour. But, among 
the hundreds of species which come under the 
head of herbaceous perennials, all that we need 
say is, consult the catalogues, for colour, 
height, and season of bloom. Make up your 
mind that you ought always to have many 
colours, and especially the three primary ones, 
in flower at one time, from April to Septem- 
ber, or even later, and make out your list so as 
to afford as many of each kind as you can, 
without overbearing the border with one thing. 
Suppose a bed of herbaceous plants to be ten 
feet wide, or a border to be six, five lines may 
be drawn along it. The plants in the back 
division must be the tallest ; these, for the 
most part, will be autumnal in their bloom. 
Indeed, the very best back would be a row of 
four feet Dahlias, alternating with a row of 
six feet Hollyhocks. By a very little manage- 
ment, these may exhibit a wonderful diversity 
of colour. In front of the Hollyhocks may 
be some of the tallest Phloxes, Michaelmas 
Daisies, Golden-rod, Delphinium grandiflorum, 
the white and orange Lilies, and such like, 
because they would grow up fast enough to hide 
the decaying lower blooms of the Hollyhocks, 
and being all in a line, one sort would not 
appear too thick, while the Dahlias continuing 
their bloom pretty nearly half-way down them 
all the season, would not require anything so 
tall before them, but anything spreading and 
trainable, such as the Chimney Campanula, 
(C. pyramidalis), which could be spread out 
on stakes, so as not quite to hide the Dahlias; 
the scarlet and white Lychnises; some of the 
less tall Phloxes, of a different colour to those 
before the Hollyhocks, some of the tall peren- 
nial Lupines, would all form very proper ob- 
jects to diversify the flowering. Rather more 
forward, we might have the Gladioli, in their 
principal varieties, Pentstemons, Lupinus poly- 
