30 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
April 8. 
j 
the purpose of growing Cotton, which turned out an entire 1 diameter, and full of blossom. It is there a perennial.— 
failure. The plant grew amazingly, hut not one pod in i John Ecrovd, Edyend, near Burnley. 
fifty came to anything. I had trees, ten months old from I “ P.S.—The thermometer during the night of the 28th 
sowing the seed, that were eight feet high and ten feet in I was at 14°.’’ 
TACSONIA MOLLISSIMA. 
(SofTEST-LEAVED TACSONIA.) 
This most beautiful of climbers for a warm 
wall, conservatory, and cool greenhouse, has 
been so often recommended by us that, although 
not a very new plant, many of our readers will 
be glad to see a portrait of its blossom. Its 
cultivation, and the cultivation of Tacsonias 
generally, is given by Mr. Beaton very excel¬ 
lently in our 207th number. 
The name of the genus is derived from 
Tacso, the Peruvian name of one of the spe¬ 
cies. It belongs to the Natural Order of Pas¬ 
sion-Flowers (Passiflorte), and to Monadelphia 
Pentuudria of the Linnaran system. It was 
found by Humboldt and Bonpland, at the very 
commencement of the present century, growing 
near Santa Fe de Bogota, and by Air. W. Lobb, 
and Air. Hartweg, near Quito. Although a native of the tropics, yet it grows there at an 
elevation of 10,000 feet above the sea’s level, and hence is capable of enduring a compara¬ 
tively low temperature. Even the city of Santa Fe. is 8,727 feet above the sea. Its hand¬ 
some pink flowers continue from August till October; and its leaves are densely covered 
with a down feeling as soft as the finest down. It wns introduced into this country in 1844. 
RIBBON-GARDENING AND YOUNG GARDENERS. 
Air.. Beaton, when writing on “ Ribbon-Gardening,” tells us that young blood is much 
required among horticultural writers. No doubt of it; but our Lion appears to me rather 
too much Johnsonian to tempt young volunteers. Just fancy the dimensions of our 
friend’s model border, only 500 yards in length! "Where is even the landscape gardener 
that dare to propose such an ntl'air in the most extensive places? Now, though I have 
little faith in Itihbon-Gardening ever taking the lead—though I allow I am no judge—it 
has too much of the “ rule of thumb ” work in it to take my fancy. Give me Nature as¬ 
sisted. Still, in some places, it may he advantageously applied where it is necessary to 
connect the pleasure-grounds of villas with the kitchen-garden, say an eight or ten feet 
walk, one hundred yards in length, with an easy, gentle curve, sufficient to prevent one 
end being seen from the other, ami that this walk is bordered on each side with Box, at least 
two feet in width, kept low to resemble turf, or turf itself; only, if the latter, double the 
width, at least. Say the holder lor the plants is twelve or fifteen feet wide, backed up 
with a hedge of Pyrus japonica, intermingled with Cotoncaster microphylla, four feet in 
height; backed up with dwarf trees and shrubs, with a profusion of Laburnums, Scarlet 
Thoms, &c.; hut taking care they do not intrude with their roots or branches on your 
object—the border. 
Now, my young fellows, here are two nice little borders for you to work upon. Suppose I 
begin with the Crocus. Though I have been a good many miles in my time, and seen lots 
of gardens, I have never seen anything that 1 fancy would look half so well as the good, 
old, warm-looking yellow Crocus to commence the season with in such a border as 
this ; hut it must not be less than one foot in breadth, and the bulbs so close 
together, that when the sun opens their flowers they will push the outside 
ones on each side to the ground, or, rather, to the Box or Grass on one side, 
and to the leaves of the double blue Hepatica, which I should propose to 
back them up with, at least another foot in width; and, say, another foot to 
follow behind them of Can That Tulips. But I must not go any further, as 
my object is only to suggest a beginning. 
The yellow Crocuses are not an imaginary affair. Some forty years sinpe, 
I was exploring, alone, a wild, romantic dell within a hundred yards of 
where Charles the First was bom, and within five hundred yards of the 
_ -i't the Bruce, when all at once appeared before me an old, neglected grass walk, that,apparently,might 
have been there in Alalcolm Cam Aloro’s time, with broad borders on each side of yellow Crocuses. I was astounded. 
Had one of the Alonks of olden times appeared, I could not have been more surprised; in fact, not so much, for I had 
■just emerged from the scenes, the dark shades of which a Rembrandt could so well pourtrny; and here I was iu the 
midst of what a Titian or an Etty would have been delighted with, and I shall never see their like again. 
But I am forgetting my “rule of thumb” work. "Well, take, for instance, to commence again with, one foot of 
common yellow Primroses, backed up with one foot of double red Hepalicas, and at the back of them one foot of double 
blue Crocuses, and so on with the others. It, may be said, What can we do with the leaves of these Crocuses a 
foot in width after the flowers are gone. They belong to the homebirds, and don’t like to be disturbed? AVby, 
when they get too long for you, begin at one end, and plait them as the ladies do their hair, keeping 
ground; they will, if well done, look interesting (not quite, perhaps, so much as 
bones of King Eobert the Bn 
nothing easier; 
them, of course, close to die 
