Aucuba japonica offers a shining example of vegetable good nature, because if ever a shrub was called upon to perform miracles the Spotted Laurel could certainly be so described. In the black grime of city cemeteries, their leaves thick with soot, they are condemned to a sunless well nigh airless existence, a picture of woe and neglect.

Again the long arching canes will reach 7 to 9 ft. and as they are not prone to suckering this bamboo will make a fine specimen plant for a lawn. A. nitida has purple-coloured canes and a rather neater foliage than murielae but is in other respects identical. Of all the bamboos this is the species I like the best.

Arundinaria nitida is readily as the arundirwias, a fact which causes regret as they are ver handsome, and do not spread all over the garden. Phyllostachys aurea, whose shoots are said to be edible, has pale cream canes but rather nondescript foliage. P. nigra grew wonderfully well in the gardens where I worked in Norfolk and Cornwall, possibly because it enjoys sunshine and a fairly dry root run.

In my garden they shot up to 4 ft., the foliage was tatterdemalion-like and altogether different from the parents. Possibly a permanently wet soil could have been the trouble. The bamboos belonging to the genus phyllostachys have not accepted Harlow Car quite so readily as the arundirwias, a fact which causes regret as they are very handsome, and do not spread all over the garden.

Greatly encouraged, I have now added colchicum bulbs to complete the picture in 1 cool purple and white. My specimen spreads by self-layering, but very restrainedly, and shows no particular preference to soil or even degree of exposure. However, I have found the autumn colour is better in part shade.

Berberis buxifolia and its slow-growing variety could be utilised as rock garden plants. The dark green leaves are silver underneath and the Bowers which appear in early spring would make a better impression if they were carried clear of the leaves. Berheris darwinii must be one of the loveliest of evergreen flowering shrubs. Usually it makes a bush 8 ft. high and is covered in late April with a mass of rich orange-yellow pompon flowers.

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