2o6 HARDY PERENNIALS 
collection of Verbascums is capable of producing 
an effect that may well hold one spellbound, for 
there are few possibilities to provide a more imposing 
display than that obtainable from such a border. 
In the background would naturally be towering 
masses of such grants as V. Olympicum, and the 
large-flowered hybrids such as Harkness' Giant, 
Miss Willmot, and V. longifolium, and its woolly- 
leaved variety pannosum. Before the yellow 
columns of these six-to-eight-or nine-feet monsters 
we would group the rich terra-cotta hybrid Caledonia, 
J. M. Burnie, and the several others of this class, 
and greater variety of colour would be introduced 
by interspersing varieties of the species Phoeniceum, 
of which there are purples, rosy pinks, lilacs, and 
a pure white. V. Wiedemannianum would stand 
conspicuously out among its neighbours with its 
three-feet spikes of dark, almost indigo, flowers, 
which turn a wine purple as they age, and further 
variety might be provided by dotting here and there 
a plant of V. Thapsus, with its big flannel-like leaves 
of a hoary whiteness. 
In the foreground would come the bright-hued 
V. Chaixii, with close-set spikes of golden flowers 
with red-purple centres, V. Blattaria, which is a 
native of our chalky downs, and also Blattaria alba, 
a white-flowered form. There are still many other 
Verbascums that might be gathered into the border, 
some of biennial character, which are quite easily 
reproduced from seed, and some true perennials, 
