A nook in our garden admits of a bed about 5x12 feet — the 
corners being shortened by two turns in the terrace wall. In 
front of the wall we have planted eight clumps of the pure white 
Phlox, Mrs. Jenkins, and two pink, Elizabeth Campbell. Before 
this and between the Phlox, pale blue Larkspur. Bella Donna. 
and two Madonna Lilies. Before these a row of purple Helio- 
trope and alternating with them in front the delicate dwarf shell- 
pink Snapdragons. The whole bed is then edged with Sweet 
Alyssuin planted eight inches apart. 
The early spring finds the neat leaves of the Phlox and Larks- 
pur showing, and as the annuals are potted and beginning to 
bloom when set out, our bed is attractive in May, a glory all 
summer and now in October is a mass of blooming Heliotrope, a 
few white Phlox heads still out and the "Snappies" peeping 
through the lavender here and there. The planting is fairly 
close, covering the ground all season, and today there must be 
one hundred heads on the Heliotrope and the air fragrant. 
These plants love potash and an open drained soil, so our 
wood ashes go on each fall. We clip the Alyssuin with the clip- 
pers in early July when the tops begin to bloom out, and in a few 
weeks the whole edge is white again, lasting until the frost takes 
them . 
M. P. L. S. 
Newtown Square. 
: Mesem ' ' First let me explain that several of ray friends use ' ' Mesem ' ' 
for short rather than MesembryantJiemani grandiflorum, and 
surely it is more convenient. 
Somewhere in the early eighties, a friend who was deeply 
interested in introducing new plants to Santa Barbara, asked if 
there were not some kinds of Mesem in the Azores, my former 
home, that were not known here — he considered it a valuable 
family for this climate. 
The result was that some time after this conversation several 
varieties arrived, the most important being the large coarse kind 
for holding earth on banks or covering unsightly places. Three 
cuttings of these came by way of Lisbon, England, and New 
York, being a month on the way. It is now to be found every- 
where in Southern California, on the heights and by the sea and 
quite far away. A friend wrote to me from Coronado near San 
DiegO, asking for cuttings after seeing the beginnings there. 
F, D. Oliver. 
Santa Barbara. 
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