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There are squares of matting covered with chestnuts, and whelks, like great snails, sticking out their horns and crawling over each other in a lively way. A strange medley! The flowers are lovely; you can buy a big bunch of violets for a son, and sou is the peasant word for a halfpenny. Gladiolus, anemones, roses, and mignonette fill the air with fragrance. It is a beautiful place this market.
A crop may be cultivated every day if desired, provided that good judgment is exercised as to the condition of the soil. It should not be stirred when too wet. The gladiolus has not a very long season for growth, and if best results are to be obtained it must be kept growing continuously.
Referring again to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, we find that the coming of the Gandavensis made the gladiolus a general favorite in gardens, and that "since that time varieties have been greatly multiplied in number, increased in size and quality, as well as marvelously varied in color and marking, so that now they have become exceedingly popular."
Now, what do these two plants mark? They give us a point in botany, though not in time, to determine when the south of England was parted from the opposite shores of France; and whenever that was, it was just after the Gladiolus and Spiranthes got hither. Two little colonies of these lovely flowers arrived just before their retreat was cut off.
In a few years many of their choice varieties seem to have dwindled away to almost nothing, or to have disappeared entirely, while they have a burdensome surplus of some others. They wonder why this is so, and some become convinced that the gladiolus will in time revert to some original species.
She specially remembered in days to come a bed of scarlet poppies that glowed like so many cups of flame against the dark masses of evergreens behind them; and the scarlet geraniums, the bold bosses of the blood-red peonies, the fiery spathes of salvia and gladiolus the low-lying verbenas like rubies cast on the green leaves and brown earth, the red gold, flame-color streaked with lines of blood, of the nasturtiums festooning the bordering wires of the centre beds, all seemed to come out like spires of flame or rosettes dyed in blood, till the garden was filled with only those two colors the one of fire and the other of blood.
There has been much effort expended in trying to originate a blue gladiolus, and this, although not a pure and perfect blue, is the nearest approach to it yet made, and may prove to be the foundation for complete success in the future. In 1908 the Primulinus, a new species from South Africa, was introduced by J. M. Thorburn & Company.
There are, as before stated, some qualities which are requisite to a good gladiolus, but this demand does not draw close or inflexible lines. There are hundreds of varieties in existence which possess the necessary traits in a considerable degree, and more are being produced every year by the growing of seedlings.
The snowdrop of course is white and the tiny little single English violet of brief though unsurpassing fragrance; we have white crocuses, white hyacinths, narcissus, lilies-of-the-valley, Iris, white rock phlox, or moss-pink, Madonna and Japan lilies, gladiolus, white campanulas of many species, besides the well-known Canterbury bells, white hollyhocks, larkspurs, sweet Sultan, poppies, phloxes, and white annual as well as hardy chrysanthemums.
Among plants, as among people, there are some which are only pleasant and agreeable to others after their death. What a difference there is in the various kinds of plants! There is the gladiolus, the most important part of which is the bulb it hides under the earth; whoever eats it dreams of the future.
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