CREEPERS AND CLIMBERS
“Our tallest rose
Peeped in at the chamber window.”
No cottage, villa, hut, nor any other human dwelling, however small
and gardenless, need be without some leaves and flowers, for it must
have walls, and up them may the Ivy wander and the Jasmine cling.
Quaintly enough, both Vine and Fig tree are tolerant of town air, and,
suggestive as they are of sylvan and patriarchal life, might flourish
in Seven-Dials if there were room enough for them to grow. The Vine,
in fact, is one of the best climbers it is possible to find for London
and the suburbs; one regrets that it is not oftener made use of, for,
to say nothing of its fruits, the foliage is so exquisitely decorative:
in summer of a pure green, and in autumn rich in yellows, reds, and
browns. The Fig tree is another handsome plant, well worth growing if
only for the sake of its comfortable triple leaves that in Eden were
found so useful. There is no occasion to mention Virginian Creepers;
everybody already knows and appreciates them. The large-leafed, loosely
flowing, common kind is preferred by some, but is not so neat and
compact as the small-foliaged _Ampelopsis Veitchii_, which clings
wherever it can place a finger with extraordinary tenacity, and never
needs a nail. Naturally, this clinging habit makes the Veitchii very
popular where gardeners are scarce.
[Illustration: VIRGINIAN CREEPER OVER PORCH]
In planting creepers and climbers we find it the best of methods
always to put in two or three at a time; winter and summer ones grow
happily side by side; after one has had his turn, another takes the
floor, and things are always lively. Even in drear November there are
berries, whose shining colours are cotemporary with the bright yellows
of the Winter Jasmine, and these together provide a feast of colour
from October to the end of January.
On taking possession of a house near town, or in any of the suburbs, we
must consider well its different aspects before we choose our creepers,
and after that must settle on the best means of training them. Some
people like to have a trellis-work of wood against the walls, and upon
grey, or white, old-fashioned houses this looks very well. Others will
stretch wire-netting against the walls, a method convenient in one way,
because a width or two can always be added as it is wanted, and it is
cheap; but wire is not a very genial support to live on. Many plants
do not like it, and I am not at all fond of it myself; but it comes in
useful sometimes if a very ugly, bare side wall has to be hidden by
degrees. Virginian Creepers do not disdain to use it when they want to
climb; but others turn from it most amusingly. The other alternative is
the ordinary garden-nail and shred, and a very good one, too, it is.
Every gardener should be generously supplied with nails of different
sizes and strong, clean shreds of cloth. In stormy weather they save
many a wreck. Sometimes stout string will be required, and stakes,
and something in the nature of a pad to soften the rub of the support
against the stem. Cloth shreds must be looked to now and then, and
renewed when necessary, for the ravages of moth and rust are only to be
expected. It is wise to use tarred string, which is very wholesome and
durable. Many plants that find a place on walls can neither climb nor
creep; these must be strongly held in place. Of such are the Cape and
Winter Jasmines, many Roses, Forsythia, the Fire-thorn (_Pyracanthus_),
and Cotoneaster, whose soft berries, with a crimson bloom upon them,
are a pleasant change from the Fire-thorn’s brilliant red and the
scarlet of the Holly.
Roses certainly do better against wood than when growing flush against
the brick of any wall, especially if it happens to be an old one: they
keep more free from insects. How different from Ivy, whose feelings are
deeply hurt and injured if it is torn from its dear walls, where it so
gladly feeds on lime and air, and makes a clustered home for twilight
moths.
Jasmines and other plants that have the same habit of growth must
not be allowed to run too much to riot. They should be well cut in
every autumn, as soon as frost is threatening; the new growths of
each recurring season amply suffice to provide the graceful trails
that hang about with great luxuriance, and will be full of flowers.
Two years running a pair of spotted fly-catchers built their nests in
the Jasmine-withes close to our windows; by June the new growths were
already thick enough to hold their tiny homes.
A delightful plant to cover a house-wall, and one that is quite
content to live in London and its suburbs, is the evergreen _Magnolia
grandiflora_. Our own was planted, in the first instance, against a
south wall, where afterwards we put a Passion-flower, and have now two
kinds of Jasmine. In this aspect the Magnolia did not thrive at all.
Then we moved it to the west, where it started growth at once, and rose
with wonderful rapidity house-high and thickly branched. It is a lovely
place for blackbirds; they never fail to build in it, so we get music
as well as scent; but the birds have flown before the flowers come.
These bloom from August to October, sweetening every dwelling-room that
is near them, and every one loves to watch the big white buds as they
unfold so slowly to show their satin linings and the big gold jewel
that lies inside each cup.
Both on our north and south and west walls we plant Gloire-de-Dijon
Roses along with purple Clematis, not for a succession of flowers, but
so that they may bloom together. Few things in nature are more truly
satisfactory than the way these two plants have of blossoming at the
same time; the colours contrast so perfectly.
Passion-flowers and _Clematis Montana_ are two creepers that, as a
rule, do well on warm south walls. For a long time we revelled in these
upon the house; but both are delicate. Even so far south as Surrey we
found a very cold, damp winter would kill them, and it is dreadful to
see an empty wall which once was full of leaves and blossoms, so we
now grow these creepers in some sheltered corner; arch of door and
window-mullion must have stronger plants.
No creepers are hardier than the Virginians, nor could any look
prettier as they wreath above a porch. More than once the shelter of
ours has been chosen for a rare bird’s nesting, and the author of
a gardening dictionary was so taken with it that he begged for its
photograph, as an illustration of that particular creeper, in his
book. I have never known anything to kill this plant except drought or
sunstroke. Do give it a little water in dry, hot weather. Our south
wall has been the scene of many adventures in the plant world. There
is a family legend about the Passion-flower that for years grew high
enough to look in (along with the roses) at our chamber windows. It
did not survive the foot-treads of Mr. Peace, the thief and murderer,
who, one fine day at the luncheon hour, climbed up by it over a portico
and into a bedroom, whence he made off with all the jewellery he
could find; die the Passion-flower certainly did, and that before the
following winter’s frost.
Another creeper of great value to the suburban gardener is
Honeysuckle; the Dutch variety for its sweetness, the Japanese for its
leaves of yellow, green, and gold. Not for the house, but for pergolas,
or as a blind to hide “next door,” or for a rustic arbour, what is more
cheerful than the Hop, which climbs to the height of many yards in one
season, and drops its pretty blooms, that have so queer and pleasant a
smell, as merrily in a sunny corner of any town garden as if it were
clambering up the hop-poles of Kent or Sussex? Hop-bines might be used
a great deal more freely than they are to hide unsightly outhouses
and barren places, but even Hops want a little care; they must have
some good stuff to grow into, and they do like sunshine. Gourds are
magnificent for all these purposes. I know one gentleman who so much
admires the leaves and flowers of the common domestic Vegetable Marrow
that he cultivates it as an ornament and not for eating, much as the
King of Siam grows carrots, with whose charming foliage he fell in love
when sojourning in England.
Of all creepers we are familiar with, _Clematis Montana_ is least
tolerant of the knife. If we happen to meet with a very old one, that
has been allowed to wander unchecked all over the place, and is untidy
at the bottom, it is quite useless to attempt to cut and prune it into
shape. Such treatment would be certain to destroy; it is better to take
it away bodily and put in a new one. The yearly pruning already spoken
of may be pursued in safety. Honeysuckles behave much in the same way
as to their dislike of too much cutting, otherwise they give no trouble
at all, and thrive in any garden soil that is fairly good. Sometimes
one has to deal with old house-walls whereon neglected creepers show
unsightly stems, and yet we cannot part with them, because of the value
of the upper growth. The best thing to be done--so we find--is to plant
some gay perennial climber that will hide defects. One of the best is
the Morning Glory (_Ipom[oe]a_) If given a sunny place, this creeper
will throw up long free garlands every summer. The leaves are prettily
shaped, and each new morning brings new buds, wonderful, twisted,
spiral buds, that open into cup-shaped flowers, pink, or white, or
blue, or streaked, or crimson.
Ivy deserves a chapter all to itself; it is the kindest and most
beneficent climber in all the world, never shabby, never tired,
blooming in November and December, when flowers are scarcest; and it
owns such an endless variety of leaf-forms and colours that one might
make an interesting garden by filling it with nothing but different
kinds of Ivy. And the same Ivy behaves so differently at different
periods of its life, that sometimes one can hardly believe one is not
being cheated by a changeling. See the Ivy that is busy climbing up a
tree or wall, how tightly it catches hold, and how industriously it
wins its way to the very summit. No leisure now for play or flowering,
it is a steady onward march--eyes right, no looking round; but once the
top is reached there comes a change. Like a successful man of business,
whose work is done, it has time now for life’s graces; the Ivy settles
down and clusters, and bears flowers and berries. It loves pretty
shapes and pictures--in short, takes kindly to the Arts.
For the borders of shrubberies no edgings are prettier than Gold
and Silver Ivies trailed over stones or rock-work, and Irish Ivy is
invaluable to fill bare patches under trees on lawns, where nothing
else will grow, or for covering up old tree-stumps or unsightly barns
or sheds. Ivy at first grows slowly. Any one who is impatient for
immediate effect had better buy well-rooted plants of it in pots; by
this means a good length can be secured at once. If a small piece is
planted, a little lime-rubbish in the ground helps very much, and so
does watering for a week or two till well-established, after which
any Ivy can be trusted to look after itself. Ivy in London is no new
favourite. Close to St. Paul’s Cathedral is a thoroughfare where
once the Prebendaries of St. Paul lived peaceful lives in quaint
old-fashioned houses, whose walls were smothered in it; houses and Ivy
have disappeared, but the old name lingers--it is “Ivy Lane.”