Some years ago our friends of the Cambridge Botanic Garden, gave the editor a specimen of this singular plant, which he keeps and treasures not only for its graceful character as a garden ornament, but also for its botanical contrasts with its near neighbors, the asparagus and similar plants. The common asparagus would be regarded as a beautiful garden ornament if it were not so common as a vegetable. Its foliage is surely graceful, and its red berries in autumn are equal to the holly in rich beauty.

Bowiea volubilis.

This plant, Bowiea volubilis, has dry seed vessels, devoid of color, and the foliage is not as fine or feathery as the asparagus, but its twining habit gives it some advantages over its kitchen garden relative. The root is not fibrous as in asparagus, but round like an onion, though as solid as a gladiolus. If it could be made to grow in the winter season, as another neighbor, the "Smilax," or Myrsiphyllum does, it would be very valuable to cut flower people. But in the writer's experience it dies down in autumn, and positively refuses to push up in the winter. Messrs. Haage & Schmidt, of Erfurt, have recently introduced it to commerce.