A FOREWORD FROM 
SLandyloam 
Lilies are natives of the northern hemisphere. Twenty species 
come from North America, eleven from Europe and Asia Minor, eight 
from Burma and India, thirteen from Central China, fifteen from 
northeastern Asia, including northeastern China, five from Tibet and 
the Chino-Tibetan borderland, and one from the Philippine Islands. 
From 1903, when a tremendous wave of interest in garden lilies 
was initiated by the discovery of L. regale, until shortly before the 
War, millions of lily bulbs were imported for our American gardens. 
Some of these came directly from their native haunts, but by and 
large they traveled via England, Holland, France and Japan, where 
nurserymen grew the well-known species and their variants and forms 
In great quantity. 
Immediately preceding and during the War, American growers 
have come to the fore, and what is really a new industry has been de- 
veloping in this country. On the West Coast there are dozens of in- 
dividuals who grow just L. candidum, or L. regale or L. auratum, or 
L. testaceum, or several of these. In Michigan, in Pennsylvania, in 
New York, New Jersey, New England, and Canada there are many 
growers raising one or more garden lilies in increasingly large num- 
bers. So far only an occasional nursery attempts to grow an extensive 
variety, but these few have very fine collections. 
Along with this development in the commercial growing of gar- 
den lilies, Americans have been making two other outstanding contri- 
butions, one in hybridizing and one in pathology. Scores of splendid 
new hybrids are being introduced, and the health of all of our lilies 
is improving as we apply the increasing knowledge furnished us by 
the pathologists as their research moves ahead each year.! 
Our own small picture is this: At Sandyloam we are now growing 
as many species, varieties, forms and hybrids as we can lay our hands 
on. But while our collection is extensive we do not attempt to grow on 
a commercial scale all of the varieties we offer. We raise for sale only 
those that we grow exceptionally well. And we purchase from out- 
standing growers and private gardeners here and there who make a 
specialty of one or more lilies. As soon as the world situation and the 
shipping situation allow we shall again import to enlarge and supple- 
ment our stocks, some of the European lilies from W. A. Constable, 
Chinese lilies from China, and Burmese lilies from our collector in 
Burma, who by the way has written us regularly in spite of all his 
trials that he dreams constantly of the time when he can again send 
us L. sulphureum, L. Bakerianum, L. ochraceum, L. nepalense, and 
L. giganteum. 
During the last few years thousands of American gardeners have 
become lily conscious and are gaining an increasing sureness in the 
handling of the genus. Along with this we find that, with growing 
familiarity with many lilies, they know more and more the ones that 
will meet their particular needs. For this reason fewer gardeners each 
year have ordered from the various collections we have recommended 
in our catalogue and so we are omitting them this season. The begin- 
ner with lilies may be puzzled in ordering and we suggest that he 
1 See discussion of disease under Cultural Notes in back of catalogue. 
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