September 1. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
419 
ROCK-PLANTS. 
I have been pushed up into a corner for a long while, 
but hitherto I have been able to hold out against 
writing bare lists of plants without some descriptions, 
however short; but. late last evening, I have been 
thrust right over the hedge, I had adopted, by a 
strong-headed Irishman, from Waterford, who signs 
himself “X. Y. Z.,” and who must have, not only “ a 
list of such plants as arc most applicable for outside 
rock-work,” but also “ the names of such rock-plants as 
may be raised from seeds.” To this I replied, on the 
instant, “ That is Waterford all over, anyhow, for all 
the rock-plants in the world can be raised from seeds, if 
you can get them ! ” He laughed right out, and his 
broad humour made mo laugh too; although I was 
little in the humour of laughing at the time, seeing that 
I lost my footing and my steadiness of purpose at the 
same push. However, the upshot of the thing was, that 
1 consented, at last, to give the two lists—one of rock- 
plants, and one of the rock-plants of which seeds 
can be procured in London—upon the understanding, 
that I must not have blame, nor any charge whatever, 
about whether all the plants and seeds, or any of them, 
would suit him or not. 
I have taken the list of rock-plants chiefly from the 
newest catalogues within my reach, and the list of seeds 
of rock-plants I took from Mr. Carter’s catalogue. 
In making my selection, I have presumed that no one 
in his senses would make a rock-work where the roots 
of large trees or shrubs could reach them; that the 
rock-work was rather intended for the cultivation of 
choice plants, either as botanical rarities, or delicate 
alpines, requiring special treatment; or as showy dwarf 
plants, or plants that hold on a long time in flower, or 
keep green most parts of the year. I could make a 
narrow border by the side ot a high terrace-walk, or by 
a low wall or bank, in which all rock-plants whatsoever 
could be as easily grown as on a made rock-work for 
the purpose; and there is not one single plant that I 
know of which would grow out with us in a mixed 
border, that would not grow just as well, and often 
better, on a rock-work that was properly executed. 
Hollyhocks and Dahlias will grow on such a rock-work 
! as well as in the best border that ever was made ; but 
' are they fit objects for rock-work ? The question must be 
settled by individual taste. All [wish to be understood 
is, that when plants and seeds were distributed over the 
face of the earth after the Flood, there was no such a 
thing as a collection of plants set apart for growing 
specially on rocks in any part of the world. I have 
been as much among rocks as any gardener in the 
kingdom—perhaps more so. I have studied the botany 
of our own rocks, even to the eagle’s nest and the ptar¬ 
migan’s gizzard, and I can affirm, positively, that ninety- 
nine plants out of every hundred, which they call rock- 
plants, do not grow upon rocks at all in a state of , 
nature. It is true, that some, yea, many, plants grow on 
I rocks against their will, so to speak ; they were so over¬ 
whelmed in the plains by a stronger race of plants, that 
they would have become extinct ages ago, were it not 
that birds carried their seed to the higher regions ot the 
country, and there sowed them high and dry above the 
ordinary vegetation, where, in their turn, they became 
the strongest, and ever since they confined themselves 
to that locality, and kept possession of the higher 
grounds, whether rocks or ridges: not from choice, 
however, as we have just seen, and as half the world 
believe to this very day, but from sheer necessity, as the 
gardener has found out long, long ago, when they were 
brought down to him, where he gave them equal chances 
and fair play in his rich and screened borders. Other 
i plants, again, that would clothe the bare hill-side, or the 
| open fields, to this day, were it not for the intrusion of 
a rougher state of vegetation, have been carried to the 
recesses of the forest by the same agency, where they 
struggled on for a time, until they, or their descendants, 
acquired the habit of seclusion, and that degree ot 
change in constitution, which enables them now to 
flourish under circumstances the very opposite to those 
first assigned to them by nature; this, too, has been 
proved, over and over again, to the satisfaction of the 
gardener, as well as many other changes ot constitution 
and habitation, equally at variance with his own experi¬ 
ments. Hence his surprise at meeting with, in the 
world, such a general want of a knowledge of the first 
elements of Natural History as would assign to every 
border, bank, brae, or hollow in or about the garden, a 
definite set of plants, purposed for such a place, and 
for such only, by the hand of Nature; to say nothing 
of his rockeries, for which nature does not seem to have 
provided liberally, or very specially, at the time of the 
general distribution; and hence it is that we cannot 
very well violato natural laws, by planting such plants 
on our rock-works as please our own fancies. 
There is a rock-work round the pond from which 
Mr. Appleby used to draw water for the Orchids, at the 
Pine Apple Place Nursery, when the tanks got low; and 
there, of an afternoon, and six days in the week, during 
the summer, you might see some of the ladies, from the 
West End, botanising after the novelties of the season, 
where they would be sure to find them—hardy, half- 
haiidy, greenhouse, frame and conservative, annuals, 
biennials, and perennials, bulbs as well, with here and 
there a weedy, botanical curiosity, or a lull-blown 
florists’ flower as round as my hat, and may-be as sweet 
as a Clove or a Carnation. All that I have seen myself, 
for the last twenty years ; also, I met with ladies there, 
who govern and control the fashions of the age, and 
never did I hear a single observation against that par¬ 
ticular way of planting rock-work during the whole time. 
If we call that No. I, I could go on and count to ten or 
twelve kinds ol ways lor planting such rockeries, and, 
as likely as not, No. 12 would be planted all over with 
such plants as you might hide in the palm of your 
hand—though, in full flower, and with names as long as 
would take an ordinary memory to stoic up in a life¬ 
time, and with flowers so small and so curiously loimed, 
that one would need a good eye-glass to make out the 
parts properly. There would be no need to get different 
mixtures or composts to suit the most rare and delicate 
plants as woidd be indispensable for No. 1 and No. 12. 
Any good, light garden soil, and a good depth of it, will 
do for all the plants and seeds in these lists; or, it not, 
I shall state the difference when I come to the particular 
name. 
Hardy Herbaceous and Alpine Plants suitable for 
planting on a properly-made rockery. 
Acorns gramineus, and variegated; A. japonicus. 
Aconitum chinense, many varieties of. 
Agrostemma coronaria, single, and double, and intermedia. 
Ajuga pyramidalis, reptans, and white var. 
Alcliemilla scricea, alpina, and lissa; line-leaved dwarf 
plants. 
Alyssum deltoidum, montanum, podolicum, olympicum, 
saxatile, and its variegated form; all those are eminently 
suited for rockwork. 
Anemone apennina, japouica and its cross (both swamp 
plants, but equally good on rockwork), apennina, ne- 
morosa, single and double, pulsatilla, thalictroides, and 
palmata. 
Antirrhinum, or Snapdragons, without end or beginning. 
Aquilegia californica, canadensis, formosa, glandulosa, lep- 
toceras, and Skinnori. 
Arabis alpestre, ciliata, collina, procumbens, and rosea ; all 
very dwarf rock plants, requiring good sites and better 
attention. 
Arenaria csespitosa, grandiflora, longifolia, nardifolia. 
Arnica montanum. 
