[Illustration: FLOWERS OF ANEMONE DECAPETALA (Natural Size).]
The genus Anemone has a great future. Even at present its popularity is
only a little less than that of roses and daffodils, but when we trust to
seeds as a means of reproducing the best of windflowers instead of buying
dried roots from the shops, then, and then only, will "coy anemone" become
a garden queen. A. coronaria, if treated as an annual, furnishes glowing
blossoms from October until June, after which A. dichotoma and A. japonica
in all its forms--white and rosy--carry on the supply and complete the
cycle of a year's blossoming. By sowing good, newly-saved seed in
succession from February until May in prepared beds out of doors, the
common crown anemone may in many sunny, sheltered gardens be had in bloom
all the year round. This is saying a great deal, but it is true; indeed,
it is questionable if we have any other popular garden flower which is at
once so showy, so hardy, and so continuous in its blossoming. A friend
beside me says: "Ah! but what of violas?" To which I reply: "Grow both in
quantity, since both are as variable as they are beautiful." But when
viola shrinks in foggy November from the frost demon, anemone rises
Phoenix-like responsive to the first ray of sunshine. Besides, fair Viola,
richly as she dresses in velvet purple or in golden sheen, has not yet
donned that vivid scarlet robe which Queen Anemone weareth, nor are her
wrappers of celestial azure so pure; and blue is, as we all know, the
highest note of coloring in floral music. But comparisons are not
required, Anemones are variable and beautiful enough to be grown for
themselves alone. No matter whether we look at a waving mass of sparkling
windflowers in a vineyard or cornfield by the Mediterranean, or walk knee
deep among the silvery stars of A. nemorosa in an English wood--"silvery
stars in a sea of bluebells"--they are alike satisfying. I believe that
there is any amount of raw material in the genus Anemone--hardihood, good
form and habit, and coloring alike delicate and brilliant; and what we now
want is that amateurs should grow them with the attention and care that
have been lavished upon roses and lilies and daffodils. But, alas! we have
some capricious beauties in this group. A. coronaria and some other
species succeed well treated as seedling hardy annuals, and others, as A.
apennina, A. Robinsoni, A. Pulsatilla, A. dichotoma, and A. japonica, may
be multiplied _ad infinitum_ by cuttings of the root. It is when we come
to the aristocratic Alpine forms, to A. alpina, A. sulphurea, A.
narcissiflora, etc., that difficulties alike of propagation and of culture
test our skill to the uttermost. Tourists fond of gardens walk over these
plants in bloom every year; they dig up roots and send them home; but they
are as yet very rare in even the best of gardens. Nor is it easy to rear
them from seeds. A year ago I sowed seed by the ounce each of A. alpina
and of A. sulphurea, but as yet not a single plantlet has rewarded me for
my trouble. Even freshly gathered seeds of A. narcissiflora will not
germinate with me, but I live in hopes of surmounting little difficulties
of this kind, and in the mean time, perhaps, others more fortunate will
tell us how to amend our unsuccessful ways. One of the prettiest species
which is now in flower in our gardens is the pure white A. dichotoma,
which carries on the succession after the Snowdrop anemone (A. sylvestris)
has passed away. Then we have dreams, and lend willing ears to the oral
traditions of Anemone alba. Is this species in cultivation, or where may
a figure of it be seen? It is said to be of neat habit, 12 inches high,
with erect, saucer-shaped, white blossoms 3 inches in diameter. The
species we now figure is well worth a place, being easily raised from
seeds. It is called Anemone decapetala, and if not by any means a showy
species, tufts of it three years from seed have this season been very
pretty. It grows less than a foot in height, and bears pale creamy yellow
flowers the size of a shilling on branched flowering stems; each blossom
has eight or nine sepals around a yellowish green center. Some of our
clumps had from a dozen to twenty flowers open at the same time, and the
general effect in the early morning sunshine is a very pretty one. We have
another species similar in habit which is just now a mass of rosy buds,
and if you blow open its sepals, they are of a bright magenta color
inside, but I never yet saw a flower open naturally on this plant. Just as
the sepals open at the tips, and you think they are about to expand, they
shrivel and fall away, leaving a tuft of greenish yellow stamens in the
center. Is it A. Hudsoni? Another species not often seen, but well worth
culture, is A. coerulea, a kind with finely cut leaves and purplish blue
flowers. Then A. coronaria, The Bride, a pure creamy white kind, with
flowers 3 inches across, raised by Van Velsen, of Haarlem, is really a
good addition to these dainty blossoms, and affords a vivid contrast to
the fiery A. fulgens. I have received this year some roots of anemones,
iris, and other hardy flowers from the site of ancient Troy, and trust
that some of these, if not new, will be beautiful additions to our
gardens. The true A. vitifolia from northern India does well in mild
localities; but best of all of this perennial large-leaved race is A.
japonica alba, the queen of all autumnal kinds, rivaling the best of all
hardy border flowers in purity and freedom of blossoming. Taken as a
class, windflowers are so beautiful that we cannot grow them too
plentifully, and but few other genera will so well repay cultural
attention at all seasons.--_F.W.B., in The Garden_.
* * * * *