No garden should be without Salvia uliginosa or S. azurea. When most of the other flowers in the border are calling it a day these lovely creatures will produce their swaying heads of intense blue high above their dying compatriots. Those tender shrubby salvias, S. Grahamii and S. Greggii, will go on blooming till frost puts an end to their succession of bright crimson flowers, but one must find a very sheltered niche for them.

Belladonna lilies and nerines come in September and October and go on flowering till mid-November. They love a southern aspect, and nerines do best if planted about ten to twelve inches deep. For me they flower more consistently than the lilies, who sometimes sulk for a year, then relent and push up their very naked buds, without a vestige of green clothing, when you least expect them. Read the rest of this entry »

Then there is the elephant saxifrage, which used to be called megasea and is now known as bergenia. The common pink variety sometimes begins to flower in October and November, but is at its best. in February. I always look forward to these chubby pink flowers, so closely packed and enchantingly beautiful with their green pistils. The darker flowered form B. purpurea, flowers a little later, and the rich rose red flowers are carried on two-foot red stems. I have a smaller form of bergenia with leaves about two inches across, but it is very loth to flower. Bergenia is a most satisfactory plant, as its foliage is lovely all the year round and particularly beautiful when it turns colour in the autumn. There is nothing more attractive than a large clump of this handsome plant among smaller, less definite plants, and it is ideal for merging a path with an awkward bed. Some people use it most effectively as a border between flower beds. It is very easily controlled by the removal of large fleshy chunks from time to time. Read the rest of this entry »

Everyone has their own ideas of what they want to grow in a garden. When I started my idea was to make as long a season as possible but I received no encouragement from my husband. Walter was a fair-weather gardener and was not interested in what happened in the winter. He wanted his brave show when the sun was shining and he could enjoy the garden, and during his lifetime I wasn’t allowed to plant many out of season plants.

But in the last few years I have found many exciting things to bloom very early in the year, and they can usually be planted so that they are not noticeable among the other flowers in their off season. Read the rest of this entry »

Rue, with its sharp pungency, must have been popular as a ’strewing herb‘ in the Elizabethan days, but it really has too definite a flavour for cooking. It is, however, one of the loveliest foliage Plantand is a welcome addition to any border. R. Jackman’s Blue is the best form, with its bushy growth and very blue leaves. The pale yellow flowers are quite pleasant, used with the leaves with more distinct yellow flowers. Variegated rue is pleasantly delicate in ton( and makes a lovely splash of light in a dark corner. Read the rest of this entry »

Everyone would like to have a herb garden— a little oasis of old world plants and delicate fragrance, with clipped hedges of box or lavender, rosemary or santolina. But it needs a big garden to allow space for such a pleasant corner, and someone with plenty of time, for such a garden, like a Victorian posy, must be kept very trim to be effective.

Even without a herb garden herbs seem to lend themselves to original treatment. I have heard of people putting down an old cartwheel and putting different herbs between the spikes, and sometimes ladders are used in the same way in a long narrow space. But I have never known how the herbs were trained to keep in their own little enclosures. Most herbs are rather woody and distinctly unneat in growth. I defy anyone to keep a healthy sage within bounds, and though one might induce parsley, chives or winter savory to stay between bars, tarragon and mint would wander away underground and come up, quite unabashed, in someone else’s territory. Read the rest of this entry »