CLIMBING PLANTS
When one sees climbing plants or any of the shrubs that are so often
used as climbers, planted in the usual way on a house or wall, about
four feet apart and with no attempt at arrangement, it gives one
that feeling of regret for opportunities lost or misused that is the
sentiment most often aroused in the mind of the garden critic in the
great number of pleasure-grounds that are planted without thought or
discernment. Not infrequently in passing along a country road, with
eye alert to note the beauties that are so often presented by little
wayside cottage gardens, something is seen that may well serve as a
lesson in better planting. The lesson is generally one that teaches
greater simplicity--the doing of one thing at a time; the avoidance
of overmuch detail. One such cottage has under the parlour window an
old bush of _Pyrus japonica_. It had been kept well spurred back and
must have been a mass of gorgeous bloom in early spring. The rest of
the cottage was embowered in an old Grape Vine, perhaps of all wall
plants the most beautiful, and, I always think, the most harmonious
with cottages or small houses of the cottage class. It would seem to
be least in place on the walls of houses of classical type, though
such houses are often unsuitable for any wall plants. Still there are
occasions where the noble polished foliage of Magnolia comes admirably
on their larger spaces, and the clear-cut refinement of Myrtle on their
lesser areas of wall-surface.
[Illustration: _HARDY GRAPE VINE ON SOUTH SIDE OF HOUSE._]
[Illustration: _HARDY GRAPE VINE ON HOUSE WALL._]
It is, like all other matters of garden planning, a question
of knowledge and good taste. The kind of wall or house and its
neighbouring forms are taken into account and a careful choice is made
of the most suitable plants. For my own part I like to give a house,
whatever its size or style, some dominant note in wall-planting. In my
own home, which is a house of the large cottage class, the prevailing
wall-growths are Vines and Figs in the south and west, and, in a shady
northward facing court between two projecting wings, _Clematis montana_
on the two cooler sides, and again a Vine upon the other. At one angle
on the warmer side of the house where the height to the eaves is not
great, China Roses have been trained up, and Rosemary, which clothes
the whole foot of the wall, is here encouraged to rise with it. The
colour of the China Rose bloom and the dusky green of the Rosemary are
always to me one of the most charming combinations. In remembrance
of the cottage example lately quoted there is _Pyrus japonica_ under
the long sitting-room window. I remember another cottage that had a
porch covered with the golden balls of _Kerria japonica_, and China
Roses reaching up the greater part of the low walls of half timber
and plastering; the pink Roses seeming to ask one which of them were
the loveliest in colour; whether it was those that came against the
silver-grey of the old oak or those that rested on the warm-white
plaster. It should be remembered that of all Roses the pink China is
the one that is more constantly in bloom than any other, for its first
flowers are perfected before the end of May, and in sheltered places
the later ones last till Christmas.
The _Clematis montana_ in the court riots over the wall facing east
and up over the edge of the roof. At least it appears to riot, but is
really trained and regulated; the training favouring its natural way of
throwing down streamers and garlands of its long bloom-laden cordage.
At one point it runs through and over a Guelder Rose that is its only
wall companion. Then it turns to the left and is trained in garlands
along a moulded oak beam that forms the base of a timbered wall with
plastered panels.
But this is only one way of using this lovely climbing plant. Placed at
the foot of any ragged tree--old worn-out Apple or branching Thorn--or
a rough brake of Bramble and other wild bushes, it will soon fill or
cover it with its graceful growth and bounteous bloom. It will rush
up a tall Holly or clothe an old hedgerow where thorns have run up
and become thin and gappy, or cover any unsightly sheds or any kind
of outbuilding. All Clematises prefer a chalky soil, but _montana_
does not insist on this, and in my pictures they are growing in sandy
ground. In the end of May it comes into bloom, and is at its best in
the early days of June. When the flowers are going over and the white
petals show that slightly shrivelled surface that comes before they
fall, they give off a sweet scent like vanilla. This cannot always be
smelt from the actual flowers, but is carried by the air blowing over
the flowering mass; it is a thing that is often a puzzle to owners of
gardens some time in the second week of June.
[Illustration: _VINE AND FIG AT DOOR OF MUSHROOM HOUSE._]
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS MONTANA AT ANGLE OF COURT._]
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS MONTANA OVER WORKSHOP WINDOW._]
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS MONTANA TRAINED AS GARLANDS._]
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS FLAMMULA AND SPIRÆA LINDLEYANA ON A WALL._]
[Illustration: _ABUTILON VITIFOLIUM._]
[Illustration: _IPOMŒA "HEAVENLY BLUE" AND CHASSELAS VINE._]
[Illustration: _SOLANUM JASMINOIDES._]
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS FLAMMULA ON ANGLE OF COTTAGE._]
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS FLAMMULA ON COTTAGE._]
Another of these Clematises, that, like the _montana_ of gardens, is
very near the wild species and is good for all the same purposes, is
_C. Flammula_, blooming in September. Very slightly trained it takes
the form of flowery clouds. The illustrations show it used in various
ways, on a cottage, on an oak-paled fence and on a wall combined with
the feathery foliage of _Spiræa Lindleyana_. I do not think there is
any incident in my garden that has been more favourably noticed than
the happy growth of these two plants together. The wall faces north
a little west, and every year it is a delight to see not only the
beauty of associated form, but the loveliness of the colouring; for the
Clematis bloom has the warm white of foam and the Spiræa has leaves of
the rather pale green of Lady Fern besides a graceful fern-like form,
and a slight twist or turn also of a fern-like character. But this
Clematis has many other uses, for bowers, arches and pergolas, as well
as for many varied aspects of wild gardening.
A shrub for wall use that is much neglected though of the highest
beauty is _Abutilon vitifolium_. In our northern and midland counties
it may not be hardy, but it does well anywhere south of London. The
flowers, each two and a half inches across, are borne in large, loose
clusters, their tender lavender colour harmonising perfectly with the
greyish, downy foliage.
There is no lovelier or purer blue than that of the newly opened
_Ipomœa rubro-cœrulea_, popularly known as Heavenly Blue and well
deserving the name. It must be raised in heat early in the year and be
put out in June against a warm wall. Here it is in a narrow border at
the foot of a wall facing south-west, where, by the aid of a few short
pea-sticks, it climbs into the lower branches of a Vine. The Vine is
one of the Chasselas kind, with leaves of a rather pale green, almost
yellowish green, colour that make the best possible foil to the pure
blue of the Ipomea. To my eye it is the most enjoyable colour-feast of
the year. _Solanum crispum_, with purple flowers in goodly bunches, is
one of the best of wall shrubs.
Another of the tender plants that is beautiful for walls and for
free rambling over other wall-growths is _Solanum jasminoides_. Its
white clusters come into bloom in middle summer and persist till
latest autumn. In two gardens near me it is of singular beauty; in
the one case on the sunny wall of a sheltered court where it covers a
considerable space, in the other against a high south retaining-wall
where, from the terrace above, the flowers are seen against the misty
woodland of the middle distance and the pure grey-blue of the faraway
hills. Turning round on the very same spot there is the remarkable
growth of the Sweet Verbena that owes its luxuriance to its roots and
main shoots being under shelter. There must be unending opportunities,
where there are verandahs, of having just such bowers of sweetness to
brush against in passing and to waft scented air to the windows of the
rooms above.
[Illustration: _CLEMATIS FLAMMULA ON A WOODEN FENCE._]
[Illustration: _SWEET VERBENA._]
These notes can only touch upon the more careful use of a few of the
many climbing plants and trailing shrubs. One of the many garden
possessions that I ardently desire and can never have is a bit of rocky
hillside; a place partly of sheer scarp and partly of tumbled and
outcropping rock-mass, for the best use of these plants. There would
be the place for the yellow winter Jasmine, for the Honeysuckles both
bushy and rambling, for the trailing Clematises lately described, and
for the native _C. Vitalba_, beautiful both in flower and fruit; for
shrubs like _Forsythia suspensa_ and _Desmodium penduliflorum_ that
like to root high and then throw down cascades of bloom, and for the
wichuraiana Roses, also for Gourds and wild Vines. There should be a
good quarter of a mile of it so that one might plant at perfect ease,
one thing at a time or one or two in combination, in just such sized
and shaped groups as would make the most delightful pictures, and in
just the association that would show the best assortment.
I have seen long stretches of bare chalky banks for year after year
with nothing done to dispel their bald monotony, feeling inward regret
at the wasted opportunity; thinking how beautiful they might be made
with a planting of two common things, _Clematis Vitalba_ and Red Spur
Valerian. But such examples are without end.