March 14, 1896. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
449 
unable to resist the insidious attacks of the fungus. 
Nothing beats the time-honoured remedy of dusting 
with flowers of sulphur. A small distributor for the 
same can be obtained at a very small cost at any 
local horticultural sundries shop. No Chrysanthe¬ 
mum grower should be without one of these 
invaluable liitle machines. 
-- 
RHODOCHITON VOLUBILE. 
Though belonging to the same family as our native 
weeds, represented by Scrophularia, Veronica, 
Verbascum, Antirrhinum and others, the plant under 
notice is as unlike them as outward form can make 
it. Only one species of the genus is known, a native 
of Mexico, and admirably suited for greenhouse or 
conservatory culture, where its tall stems can be 
trained up the rafters. As may be seen by reference 
to the accompan) iog illustration, the flowers are 
produced singly from the axils of the leaves and have 
a very much enlarged, widely-bell-shaped, five-lobed 
calyx which is of a soft red colour. The corolla is 
tubular, funnel-shaped, and five-lobed at the mouth 
and blood-red. The leaves are heart-shaped, and the 
larger ones more or less toothed. When the main 
stems are trained to the roof and the slender twigs 
allowed to depend gracefully and naturally, the plant 
is handsome and singularly attractive, both 
from its own intrinsic beauty and uncomrr on appear¬ 
ance. The plant may be grown in a tub, large pot, 
or, what is better, planted out in a narrow border, 
specially prepared for its reception in the greenhouse 
Or cool conservatory. A moderately rich, sandy 
loam, well-drained in the bottom,will answer all that 
is necessary in the way of compost. The plant may 
be raised from seeds or from cuttings of young shoots, 
taken in August and inserted in sandy material under 
a bell glass. The rooted cuttings or seedlings should 
be grown to a size fitting them to be well exposed 
to light when planted out. 
■ - «*•» - 
THE ARRANGEMENT OF PLANTS FOR 
HOME DECORATIONS AND 
EXHIBITION. 
('Concluded from f. 420.) 
Outdoor Decorations. 
Whether, therefore,our grouping is to be in our con¬ 
servatories and hothouses or in the garden outside, 
let our aim and object be to copy Nature rather than 
set her an example. Has it not occurred to most of 
us at one time or another that we have been struck 
with something very simple in itself, or heard the 
remark, how natural it looks ! Where a complicated 
and laboured effect may be admired for the amount 
of skill and labour brought to bear upon it, the spon¬ 
taneous expression of admiration is absent, and 
although the first time or two such kind of work is seen 
and admired, it soon becomes stale. Here, then, comes 
in one of the many advantages that our hardy herba¬ 
ceous and alpine plants possess when compared with 
their less hardy competitors when used for summer 
effects. In the one case we find continual change 
taking place; in the other, the same effect day after 
day—except it may be a day after heavy rains, when 
there is little or no effect at all. Do not let us, how¬ 
ever, forget that to be successful we must group our 
hardy plants as well as those inside in large enough 
masses to make them effective. Here, again, that 
would depend upon the size of the garden at our 
command. A small clump may be effected in a small 
garden, but be lost in a large garden. We have 
spoken about the groundwork in the arrangement of 
our more choice plants in use for indoor decoration— 
that some system can be profitably carried out with 
our hardy plants out of doors. Indeed, I am inclined 
to think that much the same system of arrangement 
will have to be carried out to get the best results. A 
mistake is, however, being made at the present time 
in testing the value of herbaceous and Alpine plants 
for summer bedding, by planting them in beds 
scattered singly over the grass ; or it may be in the 
form of a geometrical garden. This is a mistake. 
To realise their full beauty they require more natural 
surroundings. 
We are now grouping our hardy plants more and 
more every year, but we must further extend the 
grouping so that we will have several successive 
crops of flowers from the same space during one 
year, and that without having to re-plant more than 
once a year, or it may be once in two or three years. 
One of those groups—perhaps two—may be bulbs. 
With such an arrangement of grouping our hardy 
plants become more interesting, because of the con¬ 
tinuation of flowers or beautiful leaved plants for 
a longer period of the year. Fashion is continually 
changing in gardens as well as in almost everything 
else, but it may after all be only an earnest endeavour 
to find out a more perfect idealism than has heieto- 
fore existed, and that the grand ideal of the garden 
has not yet been realised, and that we are at the 
present time fast drifting to a favourable solution of 
the question. Those of us who are old enough to 
look back on the different changes that have taken 
place in a lifetime in gardening can easily note the 
various changes that have taken place, and see where 
many improvements have been carried out in the 
formation of different gardens. 
At the same time there crops up a strong point in 
favour of the natural system of grouping, as I have 
endeavoured to put before you this evening,and that is, 
where Nature has been left to work out her own grand 
work, little alteration has been required. We do not 
desire to alter the natural shape of that handsome 
Rhododendron with a head 30 ft. through, an object 
of admiration—adoration I was about to say—or the 
outline of that stately Pine towering over 100 ft. above 
our heads. No! Oh no ! it is not in that line our ideas 
of alteration run, but rather that we may see our 
way more clearly to follow Nature in all our en¬ 
deavours and earnest desire to obtain effect by the 
artificial working out of our designs. "Many men,many 
minds,” is a heading I have written many times in 
my copy-book at school; still, it holds good, and the 
work of those men and minds gives us many oppor¬ 
tunities for studying gardens under many different 
aspects. It may be only those who have a properly 
balanced and healthy mind that are able to make a 
choice of all the good points that are to be met with 
here and there throughout the country. I for one 
will gladly hail the day when the man arises in our 
midst who can make that ideal garden embracing 
all points. I will gladly spend my holidays in 
journeying to see it, if I may be permitted such 
a privilege, Alas ! ’ Such a day, I am afraid, 
is far distant; the many minds would fail to agree 
that the ideal had been achieved. 
Still, I think we are all driving on the right road 
to improve our gardens, and that this system of 
grouping may yet realise in the future more than we 
may see in it at the present moment. We do not all 
see with the same eyes; I may be looking at the 
realisation ; you at it as you see it, or, it may be, as 
it never did or will exist. Yet we may all be highly 
delighted. So it may be that I will fail to impress 
RHODOCHITON VOLUBILE. 
