CLIMBERS.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1848, 24 January 1880, Page 3

CLIMBERS.

From the climbers round my own house (says a correspondent of the "Gardeners' Chronicle") there is a constant succession of bloom. On the south side an immense Magnolia grandiilora is this year loaded with bloom. The floweis open well too, and their delicious fragrance fills the house. They do not last long nor travel well, though some of mine go to friends in Scotland in the weekly hamper which makes a small return for the grouse which are sent down from time to time. Next to the Magnolia is a very fine yellow Jasmine (Jasminnm revolu • turn), which has beautiful foliage and pretty yellow flowers, but they drop too easily, and their scent is what is commonly called "faint," and by no means pleasing. Beneath the Jasmine a sturdy old Myrtle grew for many a year ; it is now dead, but in spring a fine Everlasting Pea grows up, which is speedily covered with flowers, and then almost as speedily swept away altogether. Close to this is a fine young plant of Chimonanthus fragrans, which is doing well, and if the shoots ripen sufficiently may flower in the winter. Clematis Vesta grows by its side. I gavo three times as much for it as for Miss Bateman, and I do not believe there i 3 any real difference. If anything Miss Bateman has the advantage. A strong plant of Jasmium nudifiorum comes next an invaluable climber; its long sprays covered with golden flowers at Christmas are most preeious. By the side of this and amongst it grows Clematis Jackmanni. The dark purple flowers are certainly rich and velvety, but the recommendation to use it as a bedder seems to me a mistake. The flowers are late in coming, and do not last in perfection long. It ought not to be placed where the flowers are expected to make a show the whole season. A large space of wall is covered by the beautiful Trumpet Flower, Bigonia radicans. This plant is not nearly so common as it ought to be. The large bunches of long trumpet-shaped flowers, coming at the end of August, are a great addition to the wall garden. Nothing attracts so much attention, and few people seem to know it. It is cut-in clo?e every autumn, and the flowers come at the end of the long summer shoots. It has the habit of what the ijoor people call "rasseling," so the offshoots may be found coming up in most unexpected places a great distance from the parent, hence the name radicans I recommend any one who has a south wall for climbers to obtain Bignonia radicans, and they will enjoy after a while the quantity of blossoms which they will have from it i the autumn months.

Underneath this Bignonia and sheltered by it is a Climbing Devoniensis, sweetest of Roses, with a perfume which nothing else can equal. It does not grow strong as it would in the milder climate of the county from which it tak?s its name, but it always flowers, and lately it has shown a disposition to improve. On the same wall Marechal Niel does splendidly, but it appears to me to be a Rose which soon exhausts itseif by flowering. Ido not think I shall ever again have from it the hundreds of blooms which once adorned its great thorny branches. Clematis montana, allowed to take its_ own way to a great extent, hangs about it in graceful festoons. For those who like scented flowers few plants are better than the Stauntonia latif olia, the perfume of which is very strong. It is, perha.s, rather delicate, but it will grow, I believe, on auy south wall. There is a curious old church at Ringmore, near the sea or the south coast of Devon, on the south wall of which there was, and probably there still is, a fine plant of Solanum crispum. The flower is very like the Potato, showing their natural affinity. It produces anextraordinary quantity of blossoms, and is certainly a very great ornament to the church when it is in flower. It is a plant not often met with, but one easily managed after it has once made a start. In that picturesque churchyard at Ringmore, among gigantic Fuchsias and many other flowering plants and shrubs, with the wide expanse of blue sea, and the cottages of the village nestled in the valley below, this Solanum seemed quite at home.

There is something about Cotoneaster which I could never like. Just as Aucuba is associated with the town area steps descending to the kitchen, so Cotoneaster is associated with dusty roads. It always looks as if it had been suffering from a recent shower of March dust. The berries are dull, the flowers inconspicuous ; the whole plant looks like one of those things which have to struggle for life. It is not much cared for, no one gives it a thought; nevertheless there is with it the tough, wiry, leafy sprays climbing about and doing well. Passion flowers might be much more coma •* than they are, and it is a great pity that such an interesting flower should not be more cultivat-d. P. cajrulea is almost hardy, though such a winter as last certainly did it much injury. It has rather an untidy appearance unless kept strictly ir> order. The fruit is curious, and some years very abundant. It grows in quantities on a row of houses on the outskirts of the south side of Dublin, called Pembroke road. I remember many years ago that those houses were covered with the fruit of the Passiflora crurulea, and presented a striking appearance on that account.

If the comparatively new Virginian Creeper, Ampelopsis Veitchii, only grew a little faster it would be an invaluable climber for places where no nail can be driven. It clings and sticks fast to anything. I hope in time to get it to cover a new iron church which is simply hideous in its naked deformity, but clothed with this Ampelopsis might look quite pretty. A Gloucestershire Farmer.