Cotton Thistle, Onopordon.—Large thistles, with very handsome hoary and silvery leaves, and purplish flowers on fiercely–armed stems. No plants are more noble in port than these, and they thrive freely in rough open places, rubbish–heaps, etc., and usually come up freely from self–sown seeds.
Star of Bethlehem, Ornithogalum.—Various handsome hardy species of this genus will thrive as well as the common Star of Bethlehem in any sunny, grassy places.
Creeping Forget–me–not, Omphalodes.—The creeping Forget–me–not, Omphalodes verna, is one of the prettiest plants to be naturalised in woods, copses, or shrubberies, running about with the greatest freedom in moist soil. It is more compact in habit and lives longer on good soils than the Forget–me–nots, and should be naturalised round every country place.
Wood Sorrel, Oxalis.—Dwarf plants with clover–like leaflets and pretty rosy or yellow flowers. At least two of the species in cultivation, viz. O. Bowieana and O. floribunda, might be naturalised on sandy soils amidst vegetation not more than 5 inches or 6 inches high; and the family is so numerous that probably other members of it will be found equally free growing.
The Great Japan Knotweed (Polygonum cuspidatum).
(Showing the plant in flower.)
Polygonum cuspidatum.—If, instead of the formal character of much of our gardening, plants of bold types similar to the above were introduced along the sides of woodland walks and shrubbery borders, how much more enjoyable such places would be, as at almost every step there would be something fresh to attract notice and gratify the eye, instead of which such parts are generally bare, or given up to weeds and monotonous rubbish.
Pæony.—Vigorous herbaceous plants, with large and splendid flowers of various shades of crimson, rosy–crimson, and white, well calculated for producing the finest effects in the wild garden. There are many species and varieties, the flowers of some of the varieties being very sweet–scented, double, and among the largest flowers we know of. Fringes of shrubberies, open glades in woods or copses, and indeed almost any wild place, may be adorned by them; and they may also be advantageously grouped or isolated on the grass in the rougher parts of the pleasure–ground. I never felt the beauty of the fine colour of Pæonies till I saw a group of the double scarlet kind flowering in the long Grass in Oxfordshire. The owner had placed an irregular group of this plant in an unmown glade, quite away from the garden proper; and yet, seen from the lawn and garden, the effect was most brilliant, as may be imagined from the way in which such high colours tell in the distance. To be able to produce such effects in the early summer for six weeks or so is a great gain from a landscape point of view, apart from the immediate beauty of the flowers when seen close at hand.[ill153]