he Gardening World, October 3, 1908 
CLXIII. 
Bulb Planting. 
The bulb planting season is always a 
busy one tor thd keen, enthusiastic 
gardener. W e will say that he has made 
up his mind to spend so much, and it 
does not matter whether it amounts to 
MOTTO FOR THE WEEK: 
t'alnuts the fruiterer’s hand in autumn 
stain, 
e l’lums and juicy Pears augment his 
gain.”— Gay. 
CONTENTS. 
lateurs Letter to Amateurs, An 627 
tumn Bernes . ° 3 2 
mpetition Awards . 
mpetition, Prize Letter . 63° 
iffodils in Grass, Naturalising 
(illus.) . 63 1 
ihlias at Regent's Park . 641 
iquire Withn . 637 
oral Clock at Edinburgh (illus.) 633 
Oiver Garden, The (illus.) . 63d 
ait Garden. The (illus.) ^ . 634 
eenhouse, The Amateur's . 635 
;rbs ... 6 42 
tchen Garden, The {illus.) . 635 
•belia cardinalis .. 63° 
chids for Amateurs . 636 
mtography for Garden Lovers 
(illus.) . < . 629 
ant, A New, for Sub-tropical Gar¬ 
dening . 642 
tspbcrries, The Culture of . 628 
ises at Westminster . 636 
ises: Work for October . 633 
veet Peas, The Culture of . 628 
ulip Princess Marianne, Early 
Single (illus.) .. 632 
ork of the Week (illus.) . 634 
Soma Qclotos ?\?o\3esbs. 
Warm October, cold February. 
St. Luke's (iSth) little summer. 
There are always nineteen fine days in 
ctober. 
i October dung your field, 
nd your land its wealth shall yield. 
ood October, a good blast, 
0 blow the hogs both acorn and mast. 
•ry your barley land in October, 
r you'll be always sober (from failure 
of good malt 1) 
- - 
iontbretia Hereward. 
The widely expanded flowers qf this 
iriety are orange-yellow shaded with a 
eeper orange on the back. An Award of 
jlerit was accorded to it by the R.H.S. 
U September 1, -when shown by Messrs. 
- Wallace and Co., Colchester, arid Dir. 
D. Davison, Westwick Gardens, Nor¬ 
ich. 
a few shillings or as many pounds, his 
own individuality will determine the way 
he spends the money. Either he will 
buy, comparatively speaking, expensive 
named varieties, or be content with older 
and unnamed varieties; he will seek the 
most effective decorative display — a dis¬ 
play that will depend very greatly, we 
will say, upon the number of the bulbs, 
sc that large masses or colonies will 
in due time reward him. It is, as I 
have said, greatly a matter of taste, but 
also .partly a matter of space. Where 
the bulbs to be grown are to be in 
bowls and pots, and grown under glass, 
named varieties will commend them- 
elves to many, but where we have ample 
space out of doors, then the massing and 
beautifying rvith unnamed varieties will 
be in favour, and, of course, many of the 
older named varieties are inexpensive 
and can be used for this purpose. 
The Winter Aconite. 
The earliest bulbous plant to flower 
is the Eranthis or W inter Aconite. 
This may well be colonised under trees, 
in orchard grass, or an) r out of the way 
portions of the garden. Where it is de¬ 
sired a few patches may be put into the 
borders, but where this is done it is 
generally convenient to prevent seeding, 
as the plants spread bevond reasonable 
limits, and the foliage grows very rank 
after flowering. 
A Grand Decorative Narcissus. 
I am myself verv fond of the good 
old English Double Daffodil—Narcissus 
telamonius plenus. It makes a grand 
decorative display. See it, a long regu¬ 
lar line behind an edging of Myosotis, 
and vou will see a bit of spring planting 
that 'is hard to beat. The flowers are 
more lasting, and the colours more 
massive and striking than the single 
varieties. But they are so common, 
there is nothing exclusive about them, 
some will say. They may be all that, 
but I am speaking from the decorative 
point of view. W e want an abundance 
of colour, massive colour, and these old 
fashioned double Daffodils supply it. 
Tulips and Hyacinths. 
A well known gardener once said: 
•■Tulips are beautiful in small beds for 
spring bedding; but they are many 
times more beautiful when making a 
long line in a border.’’ Anyone who takes 
the ^trouble will easily prove the truth 
of these words. Tulips in small beds 
are singularly formal and conventional, 
and the^v lose these undesirable qualities 
in a border. It is one thing, Ave must 
remember, to admire a formal garden, 
but quite another -Lor the individual 
flowers themselves to look formal ; the 
difference may lie a subtle one, but there 
is a difierence. Vv e may have charming 
colour schemes with these plants—scarlei 
and while; or, if wc want a yet more 
gorgeous scheme have the gorgeous 
1’arrOt Tulips. Then, again, another 
scheme will give us the bright pink, rose 
colour, white, and pale sulphur yellow, 
and in this scheme of colour, if we wish, 
we may include the Hyacinths of similar 
colouring. There is a great Aarm in 
growing Hyacinths in the spring garden 
because they have their sweet fragrance 
in addition' to their bright colouring. 
Thev are among the small list of sweet 
scented flowers that are brilliant in 
colour. 
Crocuses. 
In planting Crocuses 1 think we do 
well to follow the example of the London 
parks, and especially when we are plant¬ 
ing in grass. 1 mean mixing in almost 
equal proportion all their colours— 
golden, purple, and white. Crocus bulbs 
should always be planted as early in 
the autumn as possible as they deterior¬ 
ate quicker than many bulbs by being 
kept out of the ground. It is a mistake _ 
to plant too shallowy; the bulbs may be 
covered by three inches of soil. 
Snowdrops. 
Snowdrops, again, should never be 
kept out of the ground for any length 
of time. The Snowdrop is never more 
beautiful than when grown as a carpet 
to a bit of garden woodland. It is 
charming amid the boles of great trees. 
1 have never known a finer display than 
a great colony of them, numbering thou¬ 
sands, and I would not say it was not 
tens of thousands along the site of an 
old moat that runs through a garden 
woodland. In very wet winters the bulbs 
are sometimes under water, and often, 
when this is not actually the case, if a 
hole be dug it will fill immediately with 
water. I mention .this to show that they 
do not mind what might be regarded as 
excessive moisture. The bulbs are never 
lifted, and they have remained undis¬ 
turbed for, I believe, over fifty years. 
Anemones. 
Although it is often advised to plant 
Anemones of the St. Brigid and fulgens 
strains in February and even into March, 
I always like a' few planted in the 
autumn. These sometimes will succeed 
best in a raised bed, at least this is the 
case where the soil is very cold and wet 
during the winter. We must not forget 
the blue flowering bulbous plants, the 
beautiful little Scillas, and the curiously 
happv looking, if I may so describe 
them — Chionodoxas. It is noticeable, I 
think, that all flowers in which blue and 
white colouring are combined are singu- 
larlv cheer}- and bright. There are four 
or five excellent varieties all worthy a 
place either by themselves or associated 
with Scilla sibirica. 
F. Norfolk. 
