364 
The Garden Magazine, July, 1924 
Wilson, and which deals largely with the wild species in their 
native homes. Until very recently such formed the bulk of 
our “collections” the plants being imported from abroad as 
collected wild. To-day such entry is prohibited, but hybrids, 
artificially produced in cultivation may be brought in and 
therein lies the present-day lure. These man-made prod¬ 
ucts are opening up new vistas of beauty and fresh channels 
of interest, and they may as readily be made here as else¬ 
where. 
Lest some of our readers may assert too vigorously that 
Orchids are for the exclusive enjoyment of only those who 
have large greenhouses and a corps of skilled gardeners at 
command we publish on another page a convincing account of 
a “band-box” Orchid collection in a city yard. It’s “the will 
to do” that wins! 
T HE Gladiolus is achieving fame as a really popular garden 
flower and is sharing the favors of fortune of the Dahlia, 
Peony, and the Iris. Its growth into its present popularity has 
been a steady upward progress from small beginnings for a good 
many years. Now the National Society is to visit New York 
to hold its 15th annual meeting and exhibition August 8th, 9th, 
and 10th at the American Museum of Natural History in con¬ 
junction with the regular meeting of the Horticultural Society 
of New York. The Canadian Society meets at Guelph, Ont., 
August 20 and 21. 
Another center of interest, perhaps the most concentrated one, 
is in New England where preparations are being made for a large 
gatheringat Horticultural Hall, Boston, from August 1 5th to 1 yth. 
No wonder the flower grows in favor, it is so certain of 
results, and modern improvements have forced attention to 
the merits of the plant in the garden. 
ope: c ol umn 
Readers' Interchange of Experience and Comment 
Where Vegetables Grow in Red 
Rock 
To the Editors of The Garden Magazine: 
OU may remember that some time ago 
you published a fine picture of Rock- 
ledge (see page 174, May, 1923, G. M.), the 
residence of Mr. and Mrs. G. W. Heath, 
near Manitou. I wonder whether you 
were told that back of this residence there 
is the oddest vegetable garden you ever 
heard of—a veritable “hanging garden” 
terraced and having beds of vegetables at 
every available nook and corner—Sweet 
Corn, Cabbages, Lettuce, Carrots, and 
what not. Bv the time one reaches the 
uppermost beds one will have climbed by 
all sorts of devious paths fully one hundred 
and fifty feet above the level on which 
the residence is placed. The frequent 
stops that one must take to regain one’s 
breath are compensated for by the mag¬ 
nificent views from constantly changing 
angles of Pike’s Peak, A 1 Magre, and 
Cheyenne Mountain. What puzzles me 
is how the gardener could have persuaded 
anything to grow in the red disintegrated 
rock that seems to form the only “soil” 
of these beds.— George Wm. Veditz, 
Colorado Springs, Col. 
Queries from Virginia 
To the Editors of The Garden Magazine: 
HE old-fashioned Microphylla Rose 
has many enduring qualities, but it 
has, at least in this part of the world, a 
very serious fault. Can you or any of 
your readers tell me why a large percentage of its blossoms turn 
brown in the bud and fall? And is there a remedy? 
Mr. Bernard Lane’s letter in the March number of your magazine 
was read by me with great interest. Never until this season have 1 
been willing to grow Cleome spinosa or pungens in my garden, but it 
wasn’t because of the common name—spider-plant. What is a name 
after all! But did Mr. Lane ever chance to smell the handsome flower, 
I wonder? However, in an out-of-the-way corner that needs lighting 
up immediately, 1 believe it will be invaluable. I have been interested 
in this plant since I saw it first, eight or ten years ago, running wild 
gloriously in the mountains of Tennessee. Gray’s “ Botany ” informed 
me what it was, but, in common with Mr. Lane and the seed catalogs, 
failed to mention its odor—also nobody speaks of any variety but pink 
and yet 1 am quite sure that many of the plants in that place had pure 
white blossoms—I wonder if any of your readers know where the white 
variety can be gotten? Gray’s Handbook came to my rescue again 
this spring. Somebody gave me in the fall, a clump of a plant she liked 
but did not know the name of. Just now it is in full and most lovely 
bloom—a thick mass of rose-purple spikes six inches high and lovely 
indeed against gray limestone. When the blossoms are gone, the cool 
green leaves, each with a white splotch on it, are also very attractive. 
Gray calls it Lamium maculatum and I can cordially recommend 
it for rock garden or border. I do not find it listed in any of my cata¬ 
logs but doubtless it can be gotten and I hope that by calling the atten¬ 
tion of some of your readers to this plant of decided charm, I may make 
some small return for the valuable information I get month after month 
from “The Open Column.”—S. Glenn Atkinson, Staunton, Virginia. 
The Public’s Point of View on the Flower Shows 
To the Editors of The Garden Magazine: 
OUR comment on the type of most of the exhibits at the New York 
* Flower Show in the May Garden Magazine was very pertinent, 
and voiced my humble opinion, and 1 am sure countless others, in point¬ 
ing out the lack of practicability of most 
of the exhibits for common or everyday 
garden use. The Pierson’s rose garden 
and Bobbink and Atkins’ rock garden 
were the only two one can imagine the 
average person carrying out. 
Won’t you continue your crusade in 
this direction and use the influence of 
your magazine toward the exhibition of 
a few garden plans from which the sim¬ 
ple ten-thousand-dollar-a-year-commuter 
(with many children and consequently too 
poor to go in deeply for “Hyacinths to 
feed his soul ”), may hope to receive prac¬ 
tical inspiration and concrete instruction? 
Why not an exhibit to drive home the 
importance and comparative simplicity of 
succession of bloom—a small plot or bor¬ 
der in bulbs and early shrubs, Flowering 
Almond, Forsythia, and the like; adjoin¬ 
ing it a companion exhibit showing the 
same space after the bulbs are over their 
blooming period and their dying leaves 
are covered by the on-coming perennials, 
Peonies, Phlox, annuals, etc.? The third 
exhibit could reveal the autumn glory of 
late Lilies and Asters and Sunflowers 
trained down to cover the spaces left 
by the defunct August and September 
plants. The illustrations in Mrs. Louise 
Beebe Wilder’s “Colour in My Garden” 
convey my meaning perhaps more clearly. 
Since the high rents in New York City 
have driven so many people to the suburbs 
and men and women are adventuring 
blindly and hopefully with their first 75 x 
100 ft. plot of land, it seems to me the 
most helpful and educational thing the 
flower show can accomplish is to lend 
these amateurs a guiding hand. 
It’s the simple mechanics of garden¬ 
ing that are so baffling to most of us, 
not only what to plant but how to 
space! In Mrs. Francis King’s delight- 
COW-PARSN 1 P (Heracleum lanatum) 
Though not suited for general gardening, the Cow-parsnip, a 
native plant, is sometimes very effective as a single speci¬ 
men with its bold foliage and vigorous umbels of white or 
purplish flowerets. It is here shown growing happily in the 
eighty-year-old Eddy garden at Brookfield, Massachusetts 
