64 
PARK AND CEMETERY. 
GARDEN PLANTS— THEIR GEOGRAPHY— XLL 
PRIMULALES. 
THE STATICE, PRIMULA, ADN MYRSINE 
ALLIANCE. 
Primula has 130 species and no end of varieties 
of very pretty little herbs, mostly confined to the 
rRlMULA SINENSIS. 
In one of i s original lorins. 
temperate and sub-arctic regions of the northern 
hemisphere, southward to the mountains of Java, 
and represented in temperate South America. A 
very large proportion of the known kinds are in 
cultivation in Europe, but the intemperate suns of 
our summers are inimical to the well being of 
mmy, especially those beautiful kinds known as 
“alpines.” There are about 7 species found in 
North America, always at high altitudes, or high 
northern latitudes. P. farinosa is found from 
Labrador to Colorado. P. Mistassinica is found 
along the wet banks of streams in New England 
and the Rockies. P. Parryi has been found as far 
Primula Obconica. Primula Auricula. Primula Cortusoides Var 
south as Arizona, and P. Rusbyi in New Mexico, 
on the margin of brooks at great altitudes. Many 
of the European and Asiatic kinds like similar 
situations, and in cultivation will be better with 
some shade, with water in summer, and mulching 
both in summer and winter. Ardisia Japonica is a 
small tree of the alliance, well adapted to yield the 
necessary shade northward to parts of New Pin- 
gland. It is scarce in American nurseries, how- 
ever. I know a bed of polyanthus in central New 
Jersey which has endured and increased for 25 
years beneath a pear tree, with a mulching of stable 
manure in winter, and watering during dry summer 
weather. P. vulgaris in vars. seems to do best 
northward, where the snow covers it regularly in 
winter. It is found in groves and on grassy banks 
beneath hedgerows in England, and is delightfully 
fragrant. There 
are a set of double 
varieties ranging 
in colors from ma- 
genta purple, 
through crimson, 
violet, rose, lilac, 
sulphur, lemon 
yellow and white. 
At the foot of the 
Alps, where the 
species grows in 
places, it is with- 
out fragrance. P. 
auricula, P. auri- 
culata, P. Japon- 
ica, P. cortusoides 
Sieboldii and 
others are occa- 
sionally met with 
in North Ameri- 
can gardens, where dodecatheon media. 
shade and such 
simple protection as sawdust or strawy manure is 
afforded. P. denticulata in variety is always worth 
the shelter of a frame. In parts of the Pacific coast 
P. Imperialis, P. verticilata, P. Sinensis, and some 
others should be tried, and attempts made to 
hybridize them. I may mention that a blue poly- 
anthus, raised by a relative of mine more than half 
a century ago, and understood to be an infertile 
hybrid between P. denticulata and a light colored 
P. variabilis, came near being lost to cultivation 
several times, and in 1864 there was but one plant 
known to me. This was given into the care of John 
Smith, the 2nd, of Kew, from whom I received 
back a plant in 1870 which was sold to Mr. William 
Bull, of Chelsea, London. I see, /rom time to 
time, that this old variety has been used by an 
