The old-fashioned Zauschneria Californica, when well grown, is a very pretty plant with its soft gray leaves and scarlet flowers. I have had it for years, and it has stood any amount of moving about into different places. It never died, and yet never flowered. I grew it on rockwork, I grew it in shade, I grew it in the sun. It formed bushy little plants, but never had a single flower. My patience was nearly coming to an end, and I fell back on the gardener's usual solace - that the soil did not suit it. When I paid a visit to Mr. Thompson of Ipswich I found it flowering most satisfactorily, and learnt from him the eternal story that what it wanted was good feeding. It should have very good rich soil, plenty of manure, and be put in a place that is free from damp in winter. This is the difficulty with so many of the foreign plants we try to grow. They want damp in their flowering-time, when we are dry; and dryness in the winter, when we are wet. I came home, broke up my Zauschneria, planted it in on the edge of a raised vine-border in full sunshine and with very well rotted manure. Helped, no doubt, also by the sunny season, it has flowered splendidly this year, and is even finer than the one I had seen at Ipswich. I think it is the better, like many other things, for watering when the buds are formed. I see in an un-modern gardening book that it only came to England in 1847. We find no difficulty in propagating it by division in spring. Cuttings strike easily in a little heat, and form blooming plants in the same season.

Phloxes have done very badly this year, whether removed from the reserve garden or left alone. In very dry seasons it is best quickly to cut them down; they flower again well when the rain comes. Michauxia campanuloides is flowering now for the second time. I have never grown it before, and its first bloom was in June, while I was away, so that I did not see it in its prime. The seed unfortunately does not ripen here, but it seems to me a plant worthy of all the trouble that biennials give; and experiments should be tried in growing it. I am now going to try it grown the second year in pots, under glass, in a cool house, in the same way as a Campanula pyramidalis is grown. I expect it will be very fine. When grown out of doors it should be moved from the seed-bed into a dry sunny place, and it wants as much water as you can give it when about to flower. It is figured in vol. xvii. of Curtis's 'Botanical Magazine,' but the flower there depicted gives little idea of the beauty of the whole plant, although the unusual shape and loveliness of the flower itself are well rendered. Michauxia tchinatchewii (see Thompson's list) is new to me and, I am told, good.

The Belladonna Lilies, treated as described in my first book, have flowered excellently, many having two flower-stems from apparently the same bulb. I immediately sent to Holland for two dozen more, as I believe there has been a disease among them in some places and that they are now rather scarce. As an example of how small a thing will affect the flowering of Cape bulbs, I noted this spring that the leaves in the more northern part of my little bed got injured by frost and east wind - not very severely, but slightly - and out of that dozen bulbs only one flowered.

A favourite little plant of mine which I have had for years has flowered unusually well this year. It is called Tricyrtis hirta, and is a small Japanese Lily - very quiet in colour, and spotted all over with lilac spots; but beautiful in its growth, and well worth cultivating. The dry rock-work seems to suit it, but I generally water it when coming into flower. Every year as it comes round it is a pleasurable excitement to see it develop its late flowers. In a book by Mrs. Brightwen ('Glimpses into Plant Life: an Easy Guide to the Study of Botany,' Fisher Unwin) it is alluded to as a typical pollenation plant. She says: 'We have seen that there are all kinds of devices by which the pollen of one flower may be made sure to reach the stigma of another; but if by any means this crossing fails, if the weather is such that insects are scarce or other conditions cause failure, then, in the case of many flowers, most curious contrivances are provided to secure seed by self-pollenation. Truly this is one of the most beautiful of God's wonders in floral construction. One of the gems of my own flower-garden is a lovely little Japanese toad-lily (Tricyrtis hirta). In this flower there are three styles which stand well above the stamens; the points of the styles are bent over, and the stigmatic surface grows mature before the anthers shed their pollen. If, however, no insect visits the flowers, pollenation is effected in the following way: the styles bend down and place their forked points in direct contact with the open anther-lobes, the style assuming almost the form of a semicircle. This is done very deliberately, for it is often a week before the act is complete.' I think that 'Glimpses into Plant Life' is a book that everyone interested in country life or a garden would very much enjoy. The illustrations are clear and good, and explain the text satisfactorily.

Nothing is more useful at this time of year in a window or a greenhouse than the Vallota purpurea. It is perfectly easy of cultivation, if the leaves are encouraged in their growth and thoroughly sunned and dried off.

The bulb should be very rarely re-potted and well watered in its growing state. I am always hearing that people lose their plants; this is probably from the gardener's over-care and keeping them too warm and wet through the winter. I am going to try them out of doors next year, as Mr. Robinson recommends, now that I have plenty of offsets, but I confess I have never seen them doing well in England out of doors. They probably do not fear cold, as I saw many in full flower on cottage window-sills in Norway.

The west sides of rockeries are often very dull, especially in autumn. I find Orìganum hybridum is a charming, interesting, curious little plant that flowers freely in a dry place in August and September. It is almost exactly the same as the old 0. dictamnus figured in vol. xix. of Curtis's 'Botanical Magazine.' Curtis says: 'Turner, whose Herbal was printed in 1568, writes thus concerning it: "I have seen it growynge in England in Master Riches gardin naturally, but it groweth nowhere ellis that I know of saving only in Candy."' This is rather a nice way of telling us where the plant comes from. It seems easy of cultivation, and worth growing. Caryopteris macranthe is a little blue dwarf shrub that I have hardly ever seen anywhere, but which I grow and increase here quite easily, and find it very attractive. It wants a dry situation, and flowers better if cut back after flowering. It should be fed with a little mulching and watering when it comes into bud. I increase it easily from cuttings in spring.

As time goes on I become fonder and fonder of the generally abused Polygonums. Mr. Robinson, in his latest edition of The English Flower Garden,' speaks of them also with much favour, and gives a splendid list of the varieties; but even he does not lay stress enough upon what entirely different plants they become if sufficiently thinned out and the suckers pulled off each spring. Otherwise they are ragged, intolerable weeds. If P. sachalinense is planted even under shade or in half-shade, thinned out to three or four shoots, and watered or hosed in dry weather, the yearly growth is absolutely tropical. It turns a rich yellow colour in early autumn, and forms a splendid feature in places where many plants would not grow at all, such as under Fir-trees or in very poor soil. P. molle I do not think Mr. Robinson names, and yet it is a beautiful thing; though some years, if in an exposed place, it flowers so late that it gets injured by frost. It requires dividing every autumn, re-planting in better soil, and thinning every spring; it is well, if it can be watered, to grow it under some tree or shrub, which protects it in case of early frost. It is worth some trouble, as its flowering branches, almost like feathery white lilac, are very handsome, coming as they do so late in the year. P. leichtlini is a very dwarf kind I brought from Germany, and will, I think, prove a useful little plant on the rockery for September flowering. The light blue Cape Plumbago capensis is doing very well this hot year, and is covered, out of doors, with its lovely cool china-blue flowers. No other colour in the garden is quite like it. It looks especially well planted against the posts of a verandah. We pot up the old plants in October, cut them back, tie them up - when they take very little room - and keep them rather dry all the winter in a cold shed just safe from the frost. We bring them on a little in the spring, and plant them out the end of May against a warm wall, though I am not at all sure that this last is necessary. All they want is sunshine and copious waterings. They are commonly treated in this way in German gardens. Mr. Robinson says they can be increased by division of the roots, but we also find cuttings strike easily in spring; and three or four young plants in a pot, as they flower at the top, are very pretty in a greenhouse or window. Solarium jasminoides can be treated in exactly the same way, though it will live out through ordinary winters, especially if sheltered by some other growth.

Last spring my jealousy was excited by seeing Camellias flowering very well out of doors. The principle on which they were managed was to plant them in a thick shrubbery with overhanging branches of Bhodo-dendron or some other evergreen shrub. The ground was prepared with a good deal of peat. In consequence of the successful healthy look of these Camellias I have myself planted out two large old trees. The great secret of success is that they should face due north, and be well watered in dry weather. If Dielytra spectabilis is planted in the same way, facing north and under the protection of some shrub, it flowers well out of doors. It always gets injured by spring winds and frosts in the open borders here.