502 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
April 11th, 1885. 
VIOLAS, 
“ What pretty Violas,” said a person recently, ■when 
showing them a few blooms that had opened thus 
early in the season while growing in a cold frame. 
They were pretty. But charming as they are, it is 
very difficult to impress lovers of flowers with a sense 
of their beauty and usefulness. They appear to have 
gone out of cultivation. A few years ago there was 
something like a rage for them, and a garden appeared 
to be incomplete without some of these pretty things. 
But there are rapid changes in the aspects of gardening. 
For a time certain subjects appear popular, and then 
they recede into a sphere of popular indifference. 
In many cases this is to be regretted, for very useful 
things maybe undeservedly neglected, and an injustice 
done them in consequence. 
I am about to give the names of a few good Violas, 
and they represent flowers of divided colours. Many 
Violas have been introduced of a really worthless 
character, for they proved what is termed “ washy.” 
Violas, for bedding purposes, if they are to be effective, 
should be of divided colours, dwarf, compact habit, 
free and continuous of bloom. The following varieties 
answer to this description : Cliveden Purple compacta, 
in the way of the old Cliveden Purple Pansy, but 
singularly compact in growth, and very free and 
continuous; Countess of Kintore, deep bluish-purple, 
edged with white ; this beautiful and novel variety has 
not so good and compact a habit as one could desire, 
but it is very pleasing indeed; Elegans, delicate 
lavender, very pleasing and effective; Golden Queen 
of Spring, deep golden-yellow, the flowers without 
marking a pure self, of good habit, early, free, and 
continuous; Lord Darnley, rich deep blue-violet, good 
in all respects, but a little late in flowering; Mrs. 
Gray, snowy-white, a pure self, free and effective; 
Queen of Lilacs, a variety in the way of the old 
Blue Bell, fine, free, and excellent habit; Queen of 
Violets, deep purple-violet, very free and an excellent 
bedder; and True Blue, probably the very best blue 
bedding Viola yet sent out, habit robust and compact, 
very free, and in every respect first-rate. 
This is a good time of year to obtain plants. They 
do well when planted out in good soil in moist 
weather. They soon take root, and their low, compact, 
and somewhat prostrate growth serves to keep the 
soil moist about the roots, and helps the plants in 
summer.— Quo. 
CHEAP HARDY ANNUALS. 
How much gardening, and what kind of display can 
anyone make for a shilling, or—shall we say—half-a- 
crown ? Let us see. Twelve penny packets of hardy 
annuals will go a very long way, if the most be made 
of them; and thirty packets will stock a good sized 
garden. Having committed myself to the above 
statement, I must proceed to explain the method 
of proving it. Suppose we have half-a-dozen 
beds, and two or three long borders now bare, and 
which we purpose to fill up at the cheapest rate ; it 
would be only fair to suggest that the soil in them 
should be sweet, and in good condition, and if not 
rich enough that we should be allowed to dig in a few 
barrow-loads of good rotten manure. This course 
having been followed, and the soil being in a loose, 
friable condition, we may arrange our stock of seeds. 
Nothing like an indiscriminate mass of clumps and 
patches will satisfy our conditions; we must have 
order, beauty, and effect equal at least to “ carpet¬ 
bedding,” or fashionable “ bedding out.” Shall -we 
begin with our borders first ? Can we manage a ball 
of twine and a few long hazel or briar rods ? If so, we 
will make a trellis on the back wall, and cover it with 
(1) the Canary Creeper, (2) Major Convolvulus, (3) 
tall Nasturtiums, (4) Ipomcea coccinea, and (5) Sweet 
Pea. The seeds of these we put in in a single line 
at the foot of the wall, about 6 ins. apart, singly, with 
the finger and thumb, covering them over as we 
proceed, and gently pressing with the foot. Near the 
back of the border we will next sow a patch or two of 
(6) tall Sunflower, (7) Helichrysum, and more Sweet 
Peas. The Sunflowers we will afterwards thin out to 
three in a patch, each plant being left a foot apart. 
The Sweet Peas we sow in a ring, about 1 ft. wide, 
and we stick in a few twigs at once to mark the spot. 
We now begin to think that we must have some 
means of recognizing the various things again, so we 
had better make up a stock of labels to stick in. 
Having got these ready, and rubbed them over with a 
little very thin white paint, we will proceed with the 
border; and we next select some tall, free-flowering 
sorts of annuals for the third row. These we decide 
shall be (8) Cornflower (blue), (9) Love-lies-bleeding, 
(10) Malope grandiflora (red), and (11) African Mari¬ 
golds (orange). These patches are all quite 6 ft. 
apart, and between them, here and there, we pop in 
a single seed of dwarf Nasturtium, or of (12) Minor 
Convolvulus, to hide the blank. The second row is 
now to be filled up, and must be very gay, in fact 
almost a solid mass of colour, but the plants must 
only range from 12 ins. to 18 ins, in height. For this 
row we choose (13) crimson Candytuft, (14) Clarkia 
elegans, (15) Gilia tricolor, (16) crimson Godetia, 
(17) Collinsia bicolor (purple and white), (18) 
Linum grandiflorum (scarlet), with here and there 
a seed or two of (19) Amaranthus (tricolor and 
ruber) ; and we sow the seeds of all these in patches 
of 3 ft. long by 6 ins. wide, with a blank of 1 ft. 
between each to give distinctness and room. We 
shall thin out all these seedlings to 6 ins. apart, as 
soon as they require it, to give the plants more room, 
although 6 ins. is rather close. Next we get in our 
front row, consisting of plants from 6 ins. to 1 ft. in 
height—or rather we sow seeds of such. For this we 
have a measure 18 ins. long, which distance apart we 
proceed to mark off the entire length of the border, 
putting in a label at each place of the sort we intend 
to sow. Here we sow round patches, a foot across, 
of (20) Mignonette, (21) Dwarf Larkspur, (22) Sapo- 
naria calabrica, (23) Silene pendula, (24) Venus’ 
Looking-glass, and (25) Annual Campanulas (blue and 
white). 
Now we shall require a border or edging, and for 
this we fix the garden-line, and mark a very shallow 
trench by pressing in the handle of the garden rake. 
Along this line we sow very thinly (26) Nemophila 
(blue), (27) Virginia Stock (red), and (28) Sweet 
Alyssum (white), in lengths of 3 ft. each. Our border 
is now completed so far as the stock of seeds is con¬ 
cerned, and as we have a few seeds of each sort left 
over, we reserve them for another place. But as the 
seedlings- begin to appear they will need attention. 
We shall have to keep down weeds, look after slugs, 
and to shelter and protect the plants from keen cold 
winds. To do the latter we shall require some sprigs 
or sprays of green yew, spruce, and laurel, which we 
will stick in around the patches of the most tender 
kinds. A cold wind or a pinch of frost will soon tell 
us which those are, and we shall have to be ready to 
protect them. 
But we have not yet filled up our beds: for these 
w r e have reserved a part of our seeds. We have 
besides (29) Ten-week Stocks, and (30) Dwarf Asters ; 
and as these are rather more tender, and we shall 
require all we can raise of them, we take a little extra 
pains in raising them. Having hunted up an old 
soap-box and a few scraps of glass, we let the box 
down into the ground by cutting it in with the spade 
in a sheltered but sunny spot, and we sow our seeds 
inside of this, having first knocked out the bottom of 
the box; we then lay our pieces of glass over, and 
wait till the seedlings come up. We give these air on 
all favourable occasions, and gradually harden them 
off, till at last we can draw up the box and lay it 
aside ; but we still keep it ready in case of a very cold 
wind or sharp frost. We take care to leave blank 
circles in our beds for these, which, when ready, we 
plant out in the reserved places, and in the meantime 
we fill up the rest of the beds with the seeds we have 
kept back. 
In the middle of one bed we sow a patch of blue 
Cornflower, and around that a circle of crimson 
Candytuft, surrounding the latter again with 
Amaranthus tricolor, and edging the bed with white 
Alyssum. In another bed we sow an edging of 
Nemophila (blue), next red Virginia Stock, then a ring 
of Collinsia bicolor, and in the centre a patch of 
Love-lies-bleeding. Another bed has Malope grandi¬ 
flora for the centre, next Gilia tricolor, then scarlet 
Linum, and outside Saponaria calabrica. The other 
beds are similarly filled up, with the exception of 
spaces for the reserve plants before mentioned. 
A few ornamental arches formed of slender rods, 
wires, and twine are also set up here and there across 
the paths, and seeds of climbers—Ipomoeas, Convol¬ 
vulus, Nasturtiums, &c.—put in at the foot and trained 
overhead as they grow, and we are then at the end of 
our half-crown’s worth of seeds, and a very cheap 
and gay half-crown’s worth I think it is.— Authentes. 
- -__P —■ 
THE FORSYTHIAS, 
The Forsythias are among the showiest of early 
flowering shrubs, and at the present time their bright 
yellow flowers occur in profusion in many of our 
gardens. There are two species, F. suspensa andF. viri- 
dissima, both of them natives of China. They are equally 
well known in Japan, but as far as historical evidence 
goes they appear to have been introduced to the latter 
place as ornamental garden plants. Be t his as it 
may, one of the plants was known to Thunberg, who, 
about the end of the 18th century, described it as 
Syringa suspensa, the name applying to the lax 
pendant branches. Thunberg thus perceived its 
natural affinity ; for the genus is closely allied to the 
Lilac, but differs in the habit and colour of the 
flower, as well as in having numerous seeds in a 
capsule, not two-seeded as in the Lilac. Both the 
species agree in producing drooping flowers in the 
axils of the fallen leaves, but differ in habit, shape of 
leaf, size of flower, and in one other character which 
invariably separates the two species, namely, the 
shape of the calyx lobes. In F. suspensa these are 
invariably much longer than broad, but in F. viridis- 
sima roundish-oblong and much smaller. They are 
quite hardy with us, though the young foliage is apt 
to get injured with late spring frosts. They thrive 
well in ordinary garden soil, and may be propagated 
with the greatest ease by layering or by cuttings. In 
conclusion, a word as to the species individually, ana 
the positions for which they are adapted. 
F. suspensa, when in flower, is very similar to the 
well-known Jasminum nudifiorum, except that the 
flowers are drooping, and twice the size. It is 
admirably adapted for a pillar-plant, or for training 
on a wall; the most effective position we remember to 
have seen it in being loosely trained to the pillars of a 
verandah. In this position the pendant branches, 
clothed with bright yellow flowers, had a most brilliant 
effect. It appears to have been introduced to Holland 
as early as 1833, but not to have reached England till 
long afterwards. In fact, we find a statement in 
The Botanical Magazine for 1851 (F. viridissjma 
being then figured) that it was not then in cultivation 
in England. Not long afterwards, however, it put in 
an appearance, for we find that “ charming specimens 
were received from Messrs. Veitch & Sons, of Exeter, 
in April, 1857,” and these were figured in the afore¬ 
mentioned work. The leaves are ternate, and the 
flowers somewhat larger than in the following species. 
Siebold assures us that in Japan it is scarcely known 
except in cultivation. 
F . vieidissijia is a small ■ erect shrub, and a very 
handsome addition to the shrubbery border. The 
leaves are lanceolate, or ovate-lanceolate, and the 
segments of the corolla are somewhat narrower than 
in the previous species. For its introduction, we are 
indebted to Mr. Fortune, in 1845—A'. 
AURICULAS. 
As an Auricula cultivator, I may state with all 
truth and soberness that the past month has been 
nearly enough to drive one mad. See what the 
weather has been: a very cold and low temperature 
by night, accompanied by frosts, and some of them 
sharp ones too ; by day chilling, cutting east winds, 
and occasional bursts of warm sunshine. Living to 
the west of London, and within six miles of Hyde 
Park Corner, the prevailing easterly winds, keen, 
sometimes boisterous, and always withering, have 
come to me laden with London smoke, that like a robe 
completely enveloped things. My Auricula house has 
a northerly aspect, and without a particle of shelter 
on the east, therefore it feels the full force of the cold¬ 
laden influence of the winds from that corner. How 
can plants be expected to make headway under such 
circumstances ? All I could do was to keep the house 
close by day and night, and by employing a paraffine 
lamp during the latter, endeavour to keep out as 
much frost as possible. I have Auriculas that have 
been endeavouring to expand their pips for a month 
past, and, at present, appear as far off as ever from 
