LILIES
WE will begin with Lilium Candidum, the Madonna or Cottage Lily. You
know it, of course: the big white lily that the Madonna, and sometimes
the angels, carry in old pictures, and that you see at its best in
cottage gardens. All gardeners ask each other ‘Why do we see great
healthy clumps of this lovely Lily in poor little neglected cottage
gardens, while in our highly-fed and carefully-tended ones it gets the
now well-known Lily disease?’ We hope your Madonna Lilies will not get
it, because it is rather heart-breaking to watch its ravages. In the
spring you see fine, healthy leaves, and you look forward to the tall
stems that will arise from them and bear great scented, shining white
flowers. But one day you notice that the leaves look rather brown. A
stem has shot up, but the leaves on it look brown, too. Every day it
seems to get browner and flabbier, and at last you cut it down because
it is so unsightly. Sometimes these sick stems bear sick, half-decayed
Lilies, but they give you no pleasure. A healthy Dandelion is far more
beautiful.
One of the best amateur gardeners we ever knew used to say that there
were some plants that throve on neglect, and we really believe that the
Madonna Lily is one of them. The cottager who puts some healthy bulbs
in dry soil, and leaves them there year after year, gets better flowers
than the gardener who fusses and feeds them. There seems to be no doubt
that the Lily disease has its best chance in a low, badly drained soil
that holds moisture. If you can give your Lilies a dry, well-drained
position, you will probably succeed with them. Buy your bulbs from a
good firm, dust them well with flower of sulphur, plant them about five
inches deep and nine inches apart in sand, and then never interfere
with them again. Remember that their flowers will last longer if not
exposed to the full midday sun, but do not plant them near the roots
of the trees, or where rain cannot reach them. They require rain, but
not stagnant moisture. Three bulbs together make a nice clump, and
they would look well in the centre of your border. The leaves die down
in winter, and when the new ones come in spring, you must look out
for slugs. If you have many, surround your Lilies with lime, soot, or
wood ashes. Mr. J. Weathers says that a frequent fine syringeing with
warm soapy water will sometimes check the disease. If when your Lilies
flower you do not want their petals dusted over with yellow pollen,
you must remove the anthers, the part of the stamen that contains the
pollen.
[Illustration: LILIES AND ROSES.]
ORANGE LILY (LILIUM CROCEUM).
This is the splendid orange Lily with purple spots so much grown
in Irish cottage gardens. It is one of the easiest and hardiest of
Lilies, and looks well against a background of shrubs or ferns. The
bulbs should be planted from six to nine inches deep, and need not be
disturbed for years. If you have to dig yours up in spring or autumn,
you can increase your stock by carefully detaching the little offsets
from the parent bulbs. In time they will make flowering plants. This
Lily will grow in sunshine or shade, and in any healthy garden soil.
MARTAGON, OR TURK’S CAP, LILIES.
Some Lilies make two kinds of roots—one kind from their base, and one
kind from their stem. Others only make basal roots, and should, on that
account, be planted in autumn. Their root action begins in October, and
goes on through the winter, so that if they are lifted in spring they
are seriously damaged, and may not flower. All the Martagon, or Turk’s
Cap, Lilies, belong to this class. If you want them you must plant them
in autumn. You can have them in crimson, white, or yellow, but the
handsomest is Album, with stems from four to five feet high, carrying
a large number of waxy white flowers. The petals in this species are
turned back, and give the effect of a Turk’s cap or turban. They are
easily grown in a mixture of loam and leaf-mould, and in a partly
shaded position.
LILIUM SPECIOSUM.
There are several varieties of this Lily, and they are all most
beautiful. They flower in the late summer and autumn, and should have
a warm and sheltered situation. They should be planted in loam, peat,
leaf-mould, and sharp sand. If you live in a cold district, you should
give these Lilies and the Auratums a covering in winter. A mulching of
manure is good for them, and will keep them warm.
TIGER LILY (LILIUM TIGRINUM).
The best variety of this Lily is Lilium Tigrinum Splendens. The
flowers are orange-red, spotted or ‘tigered’ with blackish purple.
A fine specimen sometimes reaches a height of seven feet, and bears
twenty-five flowers. All the Tiger Lilies are easily grown in a
well-drained soil in a partly shaded situation. They can be increased
by offsets, or by the little blackish bulblets you will see on the
stems amongst the leaves. These will drop and root themselves if not
gathered, but they will not make flowering bulbs for some years.
LILIUM AURATUM.
This is the King of Lilies, the ‘Golden Lily of Japan,’ and a native
of that country. If you live within reach of Kew Gardens, you should
go there in summer on purpose to see these splendid Lilies flowering
amongst the Rhododendrons, where they have a moist, peaty soil for
their roots. Mr. Wallace, of Colchester, the great authority on Lilies,
says that the Auratum likes a strong soil, not too heavy, a good
friable loam. It should be planted about three times its own depth,
and, if you can possibly get it, in some moist sea-sand. It is one
of the stem-rooting Lilies, and will sometimes get support through
its flowering season from these roots only. But if it is to make good
bulb growth, too, so as to come up and flower another year, it must
have basal roots, and be planted directly it arrives from Japan. It
requires a warm and sheltered situation, and in spring likes a mulching
of well-rotted manure. Do not put it where it can be shaken by violent
winds or scorched by a full midday sun. The best variety is Auratum
Platyphyllum. There is one thing you must remember about all Lilies,
and that is that they sometimes lie dormant for a year. We have often
found they did this after removal. We once planned a fine display of
the Madonna Lily in a corner of a new border, but though we bought
dozens of bulbs and put them in, none came up. We thought they must
have resented the move and died; but when we grubbed down amongst them
to see what had happened, we found every bulb as plump and healthy as
we could wish. They were having a year’s sleep.
DAY LILY (HEMEROCALLIS).
This belongs to the Lily Order, but it is not a bulb. It is a
herbaceous plant, with a rhizome and short, fleshy roots, rather like
a bunch of brownish-white fingers. They succeed in any good garden
soil, but they like one that has been well manured some weeks before
planting. They should be left undisturbed three or four years, and
may then be divided in autumn when the leaves have withered. When you
replant, put them from twelve to eighteen inches apart. The flowers
are yellow or tawny, and only last for a day, or at most two. But they
succeed each other quickly for several weeks. The Greek name means
‘Beauty of a day.’
LILY OF THE VALLEY (CONVALLARIA MAJALIS).
There is a popular idea that the Lily of the Valley will grow in any
kind of deep shade, and so you see its poor, starved leaves struggling
for life under evergreen shrubs, or the strong roots of trees that
steal all its nourishment. The Lily of the Valley does like shade for
the greater part of the day, but it is a plant that requires proper
food. It will stand sun if you give it a deep, rich soil. The best
situation for it is under a wall with a north or west aspect, or in
any shady place that has good soil with some sand in it, and fresh air
overhead. The bed should be made in October, and the little tuberous
roots set two inches apart each way, with the point of the crown just
under the soil. Work the soil well amongst and over the branching roots
as you plant. In a cold climate protect the bed with bracken or dead
leaves in winter, or, better still, with a covering of manure. After
four years your Lilies of the Valley should have grown into a thick mat
of leaves. Then in October you must dig them up, dress your bed with
fresh manure, soil and sand, pull your plants apart, and set them in
rows again. If you can make two beds, one in sun and one in shade, you
will have a longer succession of bloom. When you gather the flowers, do
not pick many leaves, and, at any rate, only one from each plant, as
they nourish the crowns.
There is a pretty story of the way the Lily of the Valley came to run
wild, as it does in German woods. Once upon a time, so long ago that
no one in Germany had any Lilies of the Valley, there lived an Abbot
who was a great gardener and a holy man. A pilgrim passing through
his district was kindly received by him, and in gratitude gave him a
withered-looking root that he said he had brought from a country where
similar roots bore lovely scented flowers. The Abbot planted it and
watched it, as he watched everything in his garden. In the spring the
root sent up a few broad, shining leaves, but no flowers. He left it
alone, and next year there were more leaves and two or three Lilies
of the Valley, the first that had ever grown in Germany. By the third
year the fame of the plant had travelled here and there, so that people
who loved their gardens came to the Abbey on purpose to see it. Every
year there was a bigger bed of the Lilies and a longer procession of
visitors to see them, and the heart of the Abbot was filled with pride
and vainglory, because he, and no other man, possessed the flowers.
But he was a holy Abbot; he became afraid of the pride growing within
him, and saw it to be evil. So one day he dug up every Lily of the
Valley growing in his garden and carried them into the woods, and
planted them here and there, that they might belong to all men, and not
to him alone; and ever since the woods of Germany have been full of
Lilies of the Valley.