Giant Fennel, Ferula.—Noble herbaceous plants belonging to the parsley order, with much and exquisitely divided leaves; when well developed forming magnificent tufts of verdure, reminding one of the most finely–cut ferns, but far larger. The leaves appear very early in spring, and disappear at the end of summer, and the best use that can be made of the plants is to plant them here and there in places occupied by spring and early summer flowers, among which they would produce a very fine effect. With the Ferulas might be grouped another handsome umbelliferous plant (Molopospermum cicutarium); and no doubt, when we know the ornamental qualities of the order better, we shall find sundry other charming plants of similar character.
Ferns.—No plants may be naturalised more successfully and with a more charming effect than ferns. The royal ferns, of which the bold foliage is reflected in the marsh waters of Northern America, will do well in the many places where our own royal fern thrives. The graceful maidenhair fern of the rich woods of the Eastern States and the Canadas will thrive perfectly in any cool, shady, narrow lane, or dyke, or in a shady wood. The small ferns that find a home on arid alpine cliffs may be established on old walls and ruins. Cheilanthes odora, which grows so freely on the sunny sides of walls in Southern France, would be well worth trying in similar positions in the south of England, the spores to be sown in mossy chinks of the walls. The climbing fern Lygodium palmatum, which goes as far north as cold Massachusetts, would twine its graceful stems up the undershrubs in an English wood too. In fact, there is no fern of the numbers that inhabit the northern regions of Europe, Asia, and America, that may not be tried with confidence in various positions, preferring for the greater number such positions as we know our native kinds to thrive best in. One could form a rich and stately type of wood–haunting fern vegetation without employing one of our native kinds at all, though, of course, generally the best way will be to associate all so far as their habits and sizes will permit. Treat them boldly; put strong kinds out in glades; imagine colonies of Daffodils among the Oak and Beech Ferns, fringed by early Aconite, in the spots overshadowed by the branches of deciduous trees. Then, again, many of these Ferns, the more delicate of them, could be used as the most graceful of carpets for bold beds or groups of flowering plants. They would form part, and a very important part, of what we have written of as evergreen herbaceous plants, and might well be associated with them in true winter gardens.[ill141]
A hardy Geranium.
Geranium, Geranium, Erodium.—Handsome and rather dwarf perennials, mostly with bluish, pinkish, or deep rose flowers, admirable for naturalisation. Some of the better kinds of the hardy geraniums, such as G. ibericum, are the very plants to take care of themselves on wild banks and similar places. With them might be associated the fine Erodium Manescavi; and where there are very bare places, on which they would not be overrun by coarser plants, the smaller Erodiums, such as E. romanum, might be tried with advantage.
Goat’s Rue, Galega.—Tall and vigorous but graceful perennials, with very numerous and handsome flowers, pink, blue, or white. G. officinalis and its white variety are among the very best of all tall border flowers, and they are equally useful for planting in rough and wild places, as is also the blue G. orientalis and G. biloba. They are all free growers.[ill142]
Snowdrops, wild, by streamlet in valley.
Gypsophila, Gypsophila and Tunica.—Vigorous but neat perennials, very hardy, and producing myriads of flowers, mostly small, and of a pale pinkish hue. They are best suited for rocky or sandy ground, or even old ruins, or any position where they will not be smothered by coarser vegetation. Similar in character is the pretty little Tunica saxifraga, which grows on the tops of old walls, etc., in Southern Europe, and will thrive on bare places on the level ground with us.
Gentian, Gentiana.—Dwarf, and usually evergreen, alpine or high–pasture plants, with large and numerous flowers, mostly handsome, and frequently of the most vivid and beautiful blue. The large G. acaulis (Gentianella) would grow as freely in moist places on any of our own mountains as it does on its native hills; as, indeed, it would in all moist loams, where it could not be choked by coarse and taller subjects. The tall willow Gentian (G. asclepiadea) is a handsome plant, which, in the mountain woods of Switzerland, may be seen blooming among long grass in shade of trees, and this fact is suggestive as to its use in this country.