June  10,  1897. 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
501 
LEAFY  JUNE. 
May,  the  month  of  hopes  and  fears,  has  fled,  and  we  are  now 
well  into,  what  one  is  inclined  to  regard,  so  far  as  foliage  and 
•flowers  are  concerned,  the  most  glorious  month  of  the  twelve. 
There  is  so  much  to  please,  so  much  to  gladden  as  the  eye  roams 
over  a  wide  stretch  of  country,  and  peeps  into  many  a  private 
demesne  where  free  gardening  has  introduced  fine-flowering  shrubs. 
The  shrubby  Spiraeas,  gorgeous  Rhododendrons,  and  the  thousand 
things  of  individual  beauty  which  collectively  form  a  feast  satisfy¬ 
ing  without  satiety..  Moore’s  invocation  to  the  month  now 
passed,  “  Come  May  with  all  thy  flowers,  thy  sweetly  scented 
Thorn,”  pleasantly  eulogises  a  period  which,  possibly,  is  accom¬ 
panied  by  more  anxiety  to  gardeners  than  any  other,  but  with 
the  advent  of  J une  a  feeling  prevails  that  we  are  well  over  the 
daneer  line.  > 
Yery  rarely,  indeed,  in  ordinarily  favoured  localities  do  we  suffer 
seriously  from  a  relapse  after  May  is  out.  One  such  occasion  only 
do  I  remember  when  nigh  on  a  score  of  years  ago  the  night  of  the 
fish  of  June  sadly  interfered  with  our  bedding  calculations  by 
freezing  all  stiff,  and  some  two  thousand  Flower  of  Spring 
“Geraniums”  were  crippled  beyond  recovery.  Respecting  May’s 
flowers,  its  latter  days  do  doubtless  shed  many  riches  o’er  the 
scene,  but  poverty  seems  always  treacherously  near  at  hand,  con¬ 
tingent  upon  sudden  falls  of  temperature,  that  we  hardly  feel  free 
to  acknowledge  the  spirit  of  life  and  beauty  developing  with  a 
rush  in  June  till  it  is  dominant  through  the  land. 
What  a  wealth  of  colour  we  have  now  among  our  forest  trees  ! 
Oaks  alone  give  such  daring  tones  that  the  attempt  of  an  artist  to 
reproduce  tints  almost  startling  in  their  vividness  would  court 
adverse  criticism,  even  did  it  not  necessitate  the  labelling  of  the 
picture,  “This  is  an  Oak.”  And  so  with  a  host  of  things.  There 
is  no  more  striking  contrast  to  be  found  than  in  the  pale,  plumy, 
tender  green  shoots  of  the  Spruce  Firs  springing  from  the  sombre 
hued  growths  of  last  season.  Probably  busy  workers  are  too  much 
engrossed  this  month  to  do  more  than  give  a  passing  glance  when 
natural  forces  are  rapidly  transforming  the  first  flush  of  beauty  in 
the  vegetable  kingdom  into  vigorous  growth.  There  is  now  more 
than  a  struggle  for  existence  amongst  the  many  things  so  quickly 
and  so  disagreeably  asserting  their  right  of  being. 
But  few  places  there  are,  perhaps,  in  which  during  this  fast- 
fleeting  month  an  augmentation  of  the  staff  for  the  period  would 
not  be  of  inestimable  service.  “Keep  the  hoes  going  while  weeds 
are  growing  ”  is  grand  advice  ;  but  how  few  are  able  to  practise  it 
as  much  as  they  could  wish  whilst  the  “  big  jobs”  are  being  grappled 
with  !  One  could  easily  pick  dozens  of  places  where  the  force  of 
such  simple  needs  are  felt ;  simple  they  are  but  mean  so  much,  and 
the  remedy  is  all  but  unavailable.  For  instance,  during  the  whole 
month  of  June  the  normal  staff  might  be  wholly  employed  in 
hoeing,  and  there  are  many  indeed  in  which  bedding  out,  planting 
out,  and  other  works  of  vital  importance  prevent  the  needful 
stirring,  and  so  “  ill  weeds  grow  apace.” 
It  is  a  fact,  and  an  unpleasant  one,  to  many  a  private  gardener 
that  his  neighbour,  the  farmer,  possesses  distinct  advantages  in  the 
temporary  employment  of  women  and  boys  in  the  hour  of  need. 
As  an  aid  to  garden  work  there  is  not  much  to  be  said  for,  or  even 
against,  the  ubiquitous  boy,  but  the  advantages  conferred  in  one 
large  garden  that  I  knew  by  women’s  labour  as  an  auxiliary  during 
pressure  were  so  great  that  one  could  wLh  this  means  to  an  end 
were  more  generally  favoured,  for  this  labour  is  both  good 
and  cheap. 
Yery  expressive  is  the  name  given  to  this  month  “  praireal,”  as 
indeed  they  all  are,  in  the  French  revolutionist  calendar.  The 
appo3iteness  of  “praireal” — the  meadow  month — must  be  obvious 
to  even  a  casual  observer,  who  can  hardly  fail  to  catch  some  of  the 
multitudinous  minor  notes  of  beauty  now  rising  from  grasses  and 
herbage,  so  beautiful,  so  perfect  in  their  modest  way.  I  wonder  i? 
our  young  gardeners,  whose  attention  is  claimed  by  more  assertive 
beauty,  ever  give  a  passing  recognition  to  these,  the  humble  and 
meek  of  our  native  flora.  Take  for  example  and  for  observation 
one  square  yard  of  an  old  pasture  during  this  month,  and — well  our 
boys  must  not  be  botanists  pure  and  simple,  but  it  is  just  possible 
that  some  knowledge  of  our  native  grasses  will  not  only  not  be 
superfluous  in  the  days  to  come,  but  may  be  distinctly  of  advantage 
to  them — to  those  from  whom  so  much  will  be  expected. 
Whether  or  not  the  palm  for  beauty  in  its  most  comprehensive 
aspect  is  awarded  con  amove  to  leafy  June,  as  far  as  gardeners  are 
concerned,  it  is  to  them  the  busiest  of  busy  seasons.  Flower 
gardens  that  are  to  be  furnished  with  tender  plants  may  be  no 
longer  delayed,  and  every  means  to  the  end  of  good  results  quickly 
attained,  and  as  continuous  as  possible  is  the  desideratum.  Never 
before,  I  think,  have  we  been  nearer  to  our  ideal  of  a  gay  and 
interesting  and  generally  satisfying  method  than  it  now  employed 
by  liberal-minded  men — gardeners — in  planting  for  summer  adorn¬ 
ment,  whereby  a  judicious  use  of  various  fashions  has  deprived 
anyone  of  them  of  that  monopoly  a  primary  craze  creates.  Bright 
blooms,  beautiful  foliage,  in  neat  design  or  bold  outline,  all  combine 
to  charm,  to  soothe,  to  satisfy.  Yet  this  is  anticipation.  There  is, 
to  my  mind,  at  present  a  galaxy  of  natural  beauty  that  no  other 
month  afford? — these  fresh  young  days  of  summer  which  inspired 
Southey  to  apostrophise  from  the  summit  of  Shooter’s  Hill  the 
spirit  of  health  borne  on  “  Showery  June’s  dark  south-west  gale.” 
— Invicta.  • 
AMARYLLIS  OR  HIPPEASTRUMS. 
It  was  my  fortune  (good  or  bad  ?)  to  have  to  record  before  the 
R.H.S.  the  history  of  the  garden  Pseony  from  their  first  advent  in 
our  gardens  up  to  comparatively  recent  times.  I  had  to  thank 
some  kind  friends,  amongst  them  the  aged  French  nurserymen, 
M.  Charles  Yerdier  and  M.  Keteleer,  and  their  recollections,  for 
the  record  of  progress  from  the  first,  of  those  interesting  plants, 
the  named  Pseonies. 
In  giving  a  short  lecture  on  Amaryllis  at  a  local  Hertfordshire 
society  I  essayed  to  do  the  same  thing  for  the  Hippeastrum,  and  in 
the  same  manner  I  had  to  avail  myself  of  the  kindly  help  of  living 
raisers.  I  had  also  the  advantage  of  Mr.  Yeitch’s  and  Mr.  Douglas’s 
papers  read  before  the  R.H.S.,  and  the  careful  records  of  the  family 
given  in  Dean  Herbert’s  “Amaryllideae.”  With  Amaryllis,  however, 
it  is  not  the  same  thing  as  with  Pseonies,  for  though  they  oan  be 
increased  by  offsets  it  is  a  slow  and  difficult  process,  and  they  rather 
lend  themselves  to  reproduction  from  seed.  Named  sorts,  though 
remaining  in  collections,  do  not  readily  become  common  garden 
plants. 
But  I  may  be  able  to  tell  part  of  the  story  of  their  progress 
from  the  earlier  species  with  the  help  of  some  of  the  raisers.  The 
first  recorder  is  the  Spoflforth  Yicar,  afterwards  Dean  Herbert, 
whose  record  of  the  then  existing  Hippeastrums  has  been  the 
foundation  of  all  recorders.  Mr.  Baker’s  “  Amaryllideae  ”  (1888) 
brings  the  family  up  to  that  date,  and  is  the  most  complete 
botanical  account  of  the  order.  In  Mr.  Harry  Yeitch’s  and  Mr. 
Douglas’s  papers  we  have  the  most  practical,  and  in  the  former  the 
most  historical,  history  of  the  garden  forms,  and  he  tells  much  the 
same  story  which  I  have  to  relate. 
Most  interesting  letters  have  reached  me  recording  the  respective 
work  done  in  hybridising  by  Mr.  de  Graaf  of  Leiden,  Mr.  Heal, 
Messrs.  Veitch’s  foreman  of  Amaryllis  ;  and  lastly,  by  one  of  the 
earliest  raisers,  Mr.  Baxter,  then  of  Broxbourne,  Herts,  who  about 
1868  had  several  varieties  certificated  by  the  R.H  S.  I  may  claim 
for  my  own  county  that  Hertfordshire  Anftryllis  as  well  as  Hert¬ 
fordshire  Roses  and  fruits  have  taken  a  foremost  place.  Herbert’s 
name  of  Hippeastrum  has  been  formally  adopted  in  “  Genera 
Plantarum  ”  for  the  South  American  species,  leaving  to  the  South 
African  Bella  Donna  Linnaeus’s  original  name  of  Amaryllis. 
The  two  families  do  not  seem  to  hybridise.  So  Herbert  found. 
Yeitch  says,  “We  have  ourselves  demonstrated  experimentally 
that  they  will  not  cross,”  and  I  have  not  been  successful  either 
with  these  nor  with  Yallota.  If  one  may  take  the  absence  of  any 
special  form  of  deviation  in  seedlings,  the  result  of  seemingly 
successful  crosses,  the  only  distinct  characteristics  of  some  such 
supposed  hybrids  were  more  erect  flowers.  It  is  curious,  as  the 
succeeding  family  of  Amaryllideae,  Cyrtanthus,  ha3  given  hybrids. 
The  known  wild  varieties  is  larger  now  than  in  Herbert’s  time. 
He  gives  fifteen  species,  Baker’s  book  records  thirty-eight.  Up 
to  1867,  when  Leopoldi  and  pardinum  were  introduced  by  Messrs. 
Yeitch,  the  kinds  bred  from  were,  according  to  Herbert,  Regina 
(Regiumof  Herbert),  from  which  sprang  the  first  hybrid,  Johnsoni, 
raised  by  the  Prescot  watchmaker  of  that  name  ;  aulicum,  and 
vittatum,  the  kinds  most  distinctly,  I  think,  recording  its  influence 
amongst  all  the  hybrids  ;  solandriflorum,  the  kind  to  which  we 
owe  the  long  slender  tubes  ;  and  reticulatum  and  its  form  striati- 
f  olium,  the  parent  of  the  winter  flowers  to  which  Mr.  Heal  alludes, 
and  of  which  some  old  forms  of  Sweet  and  Colville  existed.  To  the 
species  bulbulosum,  with  its  varieties,  and  to  fulgidum,  equestri- 
forme  and  rutilum  we  probably  owe  the  scarlet  of  our  modern 
varieties. 
Dean  Herbert  was  the  first  really  considerable  hybridiser, 
working  from  1824  to  1847.  Many  crosses  figured  in  the  illus¬ 
trated  journals  of  those  and  succeeding  years.  He  did  not  advance 
much  in  shape  or  colour,  but  he  laid  the  foundation  of  our  present 
race. 
Garraway  of  Bristol  raised,  in  1835,  from  the  form  of  aulicum, 
figured  in  the  “Botanical  Register”  of  1826,  the  variety  Acramanni 
pulcherrimum,  and  its  singular  beauty  led  Yan  Houtte,  De  Graaf,  and 
others  on  the  Continent  to  commence  crossing,  and  in  England 
Messrs.  Henderson,  Mr.  Holford  of  Westonbirt,  Speed  of  Chats- 
worth,  and  amongst  others  my  neighbour  Mr.  Baxter  of  Broxbourne. 
