Читать книгу Talks About Flowers - Mrs. M. D. Wellcome - Страница 7

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Mr. B. K. Bliss, of New York, in a note, said: "We have put into your box a packet of flower seeds for the wild garden, which we think will interest you. We also send you the initial number of our new paper, "The American Garden." In this journal I find a very interesting article on "The Wild Garden," how to make it, and a description of one at the country residence of Mr. M. S. Beach, near Peekskill, from his own pen. We will quote a part of it. He says: "We plowed a strip about six feet wide all around a five-acre field, close to the fence. On this plowed ground, the seed, previously well mixed, was thrown just as it happened to come. The surface having afterwards been well smoothed over, we waited the result. This proved satisfactory. We had a wild garden indeed. The plants came up as thickly as they could grow, and flourished and blossomed as freely as though they had enjoyed all the care usually given to hot-house exotics.

"Sweet Alyssum, Mignonnette, the pretty blue Nemophila and bright colored Phlox Drummondii seemed to cover the ground. Morning Glories of every shade and delicate Cypress vines tried to cover the fences and run up every tree. Quaint little yellow and green Gourds appeared in the most unexpected places, and the whole bed seemed to be ablaze with the orange and yellow of the Eschscholtzia, Marigolds, Calendula Officinalis and Zinnias. One of the chief charms of this wild flower bed was the variety and change—not from season to season, but from day to day. Every morning would find some new, unexpected, and previously forgotten flower in bloom."

The packet of Flower Seeds for the "Wild Garden" consists of more than a hundred varieties, sufficient for a square rod of ground. There must needs be a peculiar charm in the "Wild Garden." When one wearies of the monotonous ribbon beds and geometrical designs so long in fashion, they can turn to the spot where flowers run riot at their own sweet will, and give daily surprises because sown broadcast without any regard to their names and location. Multitudes there are, who, with abundance of land at their command, can have one on a large scale, others can have, but a small spot. There are many who have ground specially adapted by its wildness for the blending of the cultivated flowers with those which grow in their native dells or woods. Wild shrubs, wild flowers, wild climbers, can be transplanted to situations quite like their own. There can be ferneries and rockeries, beds of violets and wild evergreens, and combined with careless grace, such tropical plants and brilliant annuals as would give the most pleasing effect and afford a beauty wholly unique.