BUDS AND BLOSSOMS AT KEW.
TAST year we advised our London friends to go and see
J Kew Gardens in the middle of May, when the hardy azaleas in full bloom combine with their humble neighbours the blue-bells in the beech-grove, to make what we always think the most beautiful outdoor flower-show of the year. This sear we are moved to say, "Go in March and see the early buds and blossoms." Kew itself, apart from its Royal Gardens, is worth a visit just now when its abundant almond- trees are in blossom, and the daffodils are rushing into flower in their trim rows between the still naked fruit-trees of the market gardens.
Within the precincts of Kew Gardens, as well as in the open meadows in the country, the daffodil is, of course, the queen of the hour, and its bright yellow is the dominazt• note in colour. The mound to our left as we enter by the Cumberland Gate is thickly sprinkled with daffodils, as well as with sweet-scented hyacinths of many colours ; and the broad shrubbery-bed of ferns that borders the grass where
it shelves down to the path—always delightful in early -spring—seems to us this spring even more delightful than usual. The prickly ferns are still in the worn russet of their last year's fronds—the new fronds have not yet poked up their curly heads—but no youeig green could make so good a setting for the delicate flowers that are peeping through the Leaf-soil as does this rich brown of the old fern. There are a few daffodils and hyacinths here too; but this border is more particularly the home of the wood-anemone, the hardy cyclamen, and the lesser celandine, all of which are coming modestly into bloom. The blossoms will of course be more plentiful a little later ; but those only have the full enjoy- ment of spring who peep about betimes, and so see, or think they see, the first blossoms on familiar plants. That is why we say, "Go to Kew in March, and take note of what is still in bud, as well as of -what is in its prime."
Next to the daffodils in dominance, both as to quantity and colour, are the many varieties of blue squill, and the Chi ono- do= or "glory of the snow," which looks like a squill, though it is none. These are distributed very freely in the beds, in the rockwork, and among the grass. Two round borders entirely carpeted with Chionodoza, and planted in the middle with shrubs of Forsythia, produce a most vivid effect in con- trast of colour. Seen from a little distance, the stems and stalks of the Forsythia become almost invisible, and the canary- coloured blossoms seem to be floating above the blue like a swarm of yellow butterflies in the air. Other garden-shrubs already in flower are the Cornel, the Pyrus japonica, pink Ribes, Mezereons, white and purple, the Rhododendron pr;scox, with cowers something like in form and colour to those of the common mallow, and the graceful Pieria (Andromeda) of Japan. Of this last there is a beautiful group close to the pond by the Palm House. The flowers bear a strong family likeness to those of the Arbutus, but a likeness that refines the type; their white is like the white of mother-of-pearl, and they droop in feathering sprays from boughs that also feather to the ground.
, In the rockwork one notices a great many cultivated varieties of the narcissus,—quantities of squills and peri- winkles, white and blue. Here are Hellebores also—the white Christmas Rose and the purple Rose of Lent—delicate Hepaticas and a noble blue anemone with a rich golden eye. The large-leaved Himalayan saxifrage is full of blossom, and so are some of the smaller saxifrages. A pretty little golden variety, not unlike our common yellow stonecrop, is looking very brilliant. It is called Saxifraga sancta on its label,—" holy," no doubt, because it comes from Mount Athos. Another pale primrose-coloured saxifrage is very pretty too, with longer stalks and larger flowers. And two or three kinds of the red opposite-leaved saxifrage make a good show of colour. The common primrose is represented, and nothing more—to see primroses in the plural one must go into the country—but a very handsome blue primrose, at the beginning of the rockwork, deserves the attention of the carious. Crocuses are fading fast ; snowdrops may be said to be over, but their grand cousins, the snow-flakes, are in their prime. In the long bed under the wall close by, gardeners may study all the squills in proper family groups; and there they will also find some choice tulips already open, and a few quaint fritillaries.
But the beauties of early spring must be noted not only among the shrubbery-beds and on the daffodil-sprinkled slopes of the Gardens. It is to the trees in the Arboretum, just now so rich in bad and blossom, that we want particularly to call attention. There is as yet not even a flush of new life on the oaks and beeches. But the leaf-buds have opened on the lilacs and the thorns, and the green haze on the willows catches the eye from far. Willows remind us that this is the time for catkins, and that comparatively few people pay as much attention to catkins as they deserve. It is to the presence on so many of our trees—poplars, hazels, aspens, alders, birches—yes, those little hard growths on the birch-twigs, that look like something between a bit of stick and a starved conelet, are really catkins just as much as the downy " palms " on the willows or the dangling tassels on the alders—it is to the presence of these flower-spikes on the boughs, that we owe the general effect of increased richness and complication in the pencilling our common trees make against the sky, and that indescribable feeling of mystery in the atmosphere of the woods. It is because the elms have been in flower for the last fortnight that the rookeries in their tops have seemed to be veiled with delicate lace curtains, and the rooks bustling about their nests to be wrapped in an atmosphere of mysterious secrecy. But nine people out of ten, if they notice at all that there is anything unusual about the elm-tope in March, explain the fullness and the glow by supposing that the leaf-buds are swelling. Whereas the leaf-buds have nothing to do with it; it is simply the effect of myriads of little pinky-brown flowers clustering on the twigs. March, too, as Tennyson taught us in "In Memoriam," is the time "when rosy plumelets tuft the larch." Nobody who lives within reach of a larch should let the month go by without getting a sight of the upper surface of its branches ; and those who have never seen them before, will be as much surprised as delighted by the lovely growth of these little rose-coloured tufts of flower among the rich crusting of last year's cones.
There is scope for the observation of catkins in most parts of the Arboretum, but for the many varieties of willow- catkin we must go to the edges of the lake. Here too we may learn to thank the willow for contributing not only silver-grey and fairy-green, but gorgeous reds and yellows, to the colour- ing of epring. There is a clump of osiers growing on one of the little islands in the lake, the twigs of which flash veritable flame-colour into the scene,—yellow passing into orange, crimson deepening into purple. These are the details that artists seize, and the unobservant public calls untrue to Nat are.
No visitor should leave the Gardens without finding out the two plantations of flowering trees near to the Temperate House. Between the Temperate House and the little building known as King William's Temple, are the plums and cherries and almonds, many of which are already sprinkled with blossom. Here too are choice kinds of Forsythia, and many shrubs of the fragrant Chinese Honeysuckle, whose small flowers come out before the leaves. The apples, pears, and thorns are nearer to the Pagoda. These flower later than the plums and cherries; and we have looked in vain as yet for signs of blossom on their branches. But they are well worth a visit for the sake of their pretty leaf-buds in various staged of bursting.
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