Imagine, il you will, a compact little pin¬ 
cushion of light green, completely covered 
in May with the daintest of upward-facing 
blue blossoms with yellow eyes. When young, 
it is perhaps four inches in diameter, but the 
innumerable tiny stems reach out and out, 
rooting as they go, so that in two or three 
years the pincushion becomes a mat, and the 
mat a blanket, and the beauty of it in the 
warm spring sunshine is not to he told in 
words. Even in midwinter, if the ground hap¬ 
pens to be bare, you will find it good to look 
upon, for the Creeping Bluet is an evergreen 
and, for all its southern origin, perfectly 
cheerful in sub-zero weather. 
Half-sun, perfect drainage, and the same 
sort of acid soil mixture that I advise for 
Trailing Arbutus are the requirements of 
Creeping Bluets. Here in Connecticut they 
do best when shaded in summer from noon 
until three or four o’clock. Too much shade, 
on the other hand, tends to make them a bit 
straggly and lessen the density of form which 
is one of their distinctive charms. They nat¬ 
urally suggest themselves as ground covers 
along the edges of Rhododendron or Laurel 
plantings, for carpeting in the rock garden, 
and many other situations where a dainty, 
low (3"-6") flowering evergreen is desired. 
Strong young plants with 4" spread: 50 cents each, 
6 for $2.50, $5 a dozen. Shipping season, early April 
through October. 
Gay-wings (Polygala paucifolia) 
I F there is a more surprising, colorful and 
wholly appealing small flower elf than this 
shy woodland dweller, I have yet to see it. 
“Gay-wings” is an apt description of its pur¬ 
ple-pink, inch-long blossoms with their two 
flaring petals and tiny fringe tuft at the end 
of the long, oddly shaped keel. A patch of it 
in blossom in May inevitably suggests a flock 
of little pink butterflies poised upon the stem 
tips three or four inches above the ground. 
Always, too, it calls to mind the Orchid tribe 
(to which it is wholly unrelated), because of 
its peculiar blossom form and color. 
Though Gay-wings is native to a large ter¬ 
ritory from New Brunswick west to Minnesota 
and southward along the Alleghanies to Geor¬ 
gia, comparatively few people know it. It is 
found in a variety of shaded, woody locations 
ranging from damp to decidedly dry, its chief 
soil requirement seeming to he plenty of leat- 
mold and acidity. In planting, give it the 
same sort of soil that Arbutus demands. 
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