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Read Ebook: The Book of Old-Fashioned Flowers And Other Plants Which Thrive in the Open-Air of England by Roberts Harry Roskruge Ethel Illustrator
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Ebook has 296 lines and 31556 words, and 6 pages
PAGE
THANKS xiii
SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS 1
OLD-FASHIONED FLOWERS 4
A GARDEN BY THE SEA 12
COTTAGE GARDENS 24
THE GARDEN IN WINTER 28
THE GARDEN IN SPRING 37
THE GARDEN IN JUNE 48
HOW TO GROW ROSES 52
THE GARDEN IN JULY 57
NIGHT IN THE GARDEN 62
THE GARDEN IN AUGUST 69
THE GARDEN IN AUTUMN 73
SHELTER AND SHADE 81
SOILS AND THEIR PREPARATION 86
MANURES 94
SEED-SOWING AND TRANSPLANTING 96
LAYERS AND CUTTINGS 101
WEEDS 103
INSECT AND OTHER PESTS 107
POINTS 111
PAGE
POPPY ANEMONES 13
FRITILLARIES 29
COLUMBINES 41
HONESTY 53
MACARTNEY ROSES 65
WHITE WOOD LILIES 75
FOXGLOVES 89
SHIRLEY POPPIES 99
THANKS
To that distinguished and generous gardener, Canon Ellacombe, I wish to express my appreciation of his kindness in giving me the freedom of his collection of old garden books, though few are so good, interesting, or useful as his own "Plant Lore of Shakspere" and "A Gloucestershire Garden."
To Mr Folkard I am obliged for the loan of his interesting book on "Plant Lore and Legend."
To Messrs Kelway, of Langport, I am indebted for many presents of beautiful Delphiniums, Paeonies and Pyrethrums, which they grow as few others can.
SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS
Many years ago an ingenious writer compiled a book dealing with a subject with which he had no practical acquaintance. The whole of his alleged observations were second-hand, being derived from previous writings on the subject. In order, however, to hoodwink the public, this author laid great stress on the uselessness of mere book knowledge, saying that an ounce of experience was worth a stone of theory.
Like many other foolish sayings, this one has been regarded as an inspired utterance, and has been copied by nine-tenths of all subsequent writers of handbooks. As a matter of fact, whilst a certain amount of practical experience is absolutely essential to the proper understanding of nearly all subjects, an intelligent reader can learn more in an hour from a sensible book than from many weeks of intercourse with merely "practical" people, and many weeks of so-called experience.
No attempt has been made to render this a complete handbook of hardy flowers. In the first place, the pages at disposal would barely serve even to enumerate them, and, in the second place, the compilation of a reference encyclopaedia of hardy flowers has been done, and done admirably, by our greatest gardening writer, Mr William Robinson, whose book, "The English Flower Garden," is in many ways the most important work on gardening which has appeared since the time of Parkinson.
The flowers here named are but a few of those which are worth growing, for to the present writer nearly every plant, when allowed to develop freely and naturally, is full of interest and full of beauty. Everyone should decide for himself what he will grow in the particular environment he may have to offer, for, once the art of properly growing the flowers here named has been mastered, little difficulty need be anticipated in growing such other hardy plants as may be thought desirable additions to the list.
In the matter of garden arrangement, I have neither given dogmatic advice nor stated fixed rules which must be followed; for it is as undesirable that gardens should be stereotyped copies of one another, as it would be in the case of their owners. I have, instead of dogmatising on the rights and wrongs of garden design, described one or two gardens which have yielded me delight, though I fear that I have not been able to conceal my own point of view. What that point of view is I have stated in my "Chronicle of a Cornish Garden," but I am sufficiently broad-minded to recognise that other styles of gardening appeal to other gardeners who are quite as competent to form opinions as myself.
A garden should, as I believe, be an emanation from the spirit of its owner, and, just as some men are formal and some informal, some prim and some Bohemian, some careful and some rash, so should their several gardens vary in style and feeling.
I have laid down no laws as to the arrangement of flowers with a view to producing "colour schemes," for I have never seen colour schemes which surpass those chance effects of the hedgerow and the meadow, or of those pleasant gardens where the gardeners' sole aim is to grow plants from the plants' point of view, that is to say, with the sole aim of growing them healthily and well. Of course, occasionally, a bad colour shows itself, but the remedy is simple and obvious. Occasionally, also, a colour discord will be perceived in bed or border, but a spade will cure the trouble in five minutes. Indeed, there is some small risk at the present moment that the individuality of beautiful plants and flowers may be too frequently sacrificed to the production of "effects." This was the deadly fault of the "bedding" system, and should be guarded against. The bedding system has made such beautiful flowers as geraniums, calceolarias and lobelias stink in the nostrils of some of us; just as the disgusting invention of Dr. Gregory has been successful in making raspberry jam a source of nausea to tens of thousands of English boys and girls.
Let us as gardeners beware of being too clever and "artistic"; Nature may be a hard mistress, but she is not a fool.
OLD-FASHIONED FLOWERS
"Adam and Eve in yew; Adam a little shattered by the fall of the tree of knowledge in the great storm; Eve and the serpent very flourishing. Noah's Ark in holly, the ribs a little damaged for want of water.
"The tower of Babel not yet finished.
"St George in Box; his arm scarce strong enough, but will be in a condition to stick the dragon by next April.
"A green dragon of the same; with a tail of ground-ivy for the present.
"Edward the Black Prince in Cyprus....
"A Queen Elizabeth in Phyllirea, a little inclining to the green sickness, but of full growth.
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