Juniperus Sabina tamariscifolia is a beautiful shrub for the fringe of a plantation, it is of robust growth, and the best of the Junipers for this planting.
Taxus baccata aurea variegata and elegantissima (the Golden Yew) are most effective evergreen shrubs. They should be planted in open sunny positions. Without doubt elegantissima has no rival, being the most useful and telling golden evergreen shrub we have. It is of somewhat slow growth, consequently should be planted fairly thick. Like the Common Green Yew, it succeeds in almost any kind of soil, but it colours best on a deep yellow loam in a thoroughly exposed position.
Ulex europæus (Common Gorse or Whin).—This common British plant needs little description here. When seen in its wild state, where it is thoroughly naturalised, it presents a most charming sight. Half-wild patches of land may easily be made suitable for it at little expense. During winter the land should either be ploughed or dug, and the seed sown during April, either in drills or broadcast, and the seedlings thinned to a fair distance apart during the following spring. When once thoroughly established, little trouble will be experienced in keeping the ground well stocked. Occasionally, when the old plants become leggy, they should be cut close to the ground immediately after flowering, and in a short time these will break away freely from the bottom. Ulex europæus flore-pleno is an invaluable plant for all kinds of ornamental planting, and is struck from cuttings, which are potted up. In this way the plants are distributed; nevertheless, it is a most important plant to have. The flower is a much brighter yellow than the common form, is produced more freely, and lasts a considerable time in beauty. It is very suitable for either making beds or forming large patches of colour behind rocks and among the fissures of the rock garden. It should be planted about 3 feet apart, in fairly good ground, and about every fifth year pruned down close to the ground.
Viburnum Tinus (Laurustinus).—A beautiful evergreen flowering shrub, and generally well known, but unfortunately it is not sufficiently hardy to plant in many parts of the country, especially in exposed positions. It will grow and flower profusely in very shallow and, indeed, in almost any soil. It makes a handsome bed, and should be planted 4 feet apart.
The Hon. Vicary Gibbs has taken keen interest in the tree and shrub planting in the gardens of Aldenham House.
CHAPTER XXXV
THE USE OF HARDY CLIMBING SHRUBS[2]
The best and best known of our good hardy climbing shrubs are by no means neglected, but yet they are not nearly as much or as well used as they might be. Such a fine thing as the easily-grown Clematis montana will not only cover house and garden walls with its sheets of lovely bloom, but it is willing to grow in wilder ways among trees and shrubs, where its natural way of making graceful garlands and hanging ropes of bloom shows its truest and best uses much better than when it is trained straight along the joints of walls or tied in more stiffly and closely. Even if there are only a few stiff bushes such as Gorse or low Thorns to support and guide it, it gladly covers them just as does the Traveller's Joy (Clematis Vitalba) of our chalkland hedges. This climber, though a native plant and very common in calcareous soils, is worthy of any garden. C. V. rosea is a very fine variety. Clematis Flammula is another of the family that should be more often treated in a free way, and grown partly trained through the branches of a Yew or an Ilex. The less-known Clematis orientalis, with yellow flowers and feathery seeds, and the fine October-blooming C. paniculata, make up five members of one family, apart from the large-flowered Clematises, that all lend themselves willingly to this class of pictorial treatment.
