h) in a pleasing manner. The earliest flowers are very
large--when fully open quite 11/2in. across--but they are more often seen
in the unopen state, when they resemble a nutmeg in shape. Whether open
or shut, they are a pure white, and their pendent habit adds not a
little to their beauty, as also does the leafy involucre. The leaves are
three-parted, the two lower lobes being deeply divided, so that at a
first glance the leaves appear to be five-parted; each of the five lobes
are three-cleft, and also dentate, downy, and veined; the leaf stalks
are radical, red, long, slightly channelled, and wiry; in all respects
the leaves of the involucre resemble those of the root, excepting the
size, which is smaller, and the stalks are green, like the flower stems.

In a cut state, the pure satin-white blossoms are fit for the most
delicate wreath or bouquet; they have, morever, a delicious
clover-scent. It enjoys a light vegetable soil in a slightly shaded and
moist situation; if it could be allowed to ramble in the small openings
of a front shrubbery, such positions would answer admirably.

The roots are underground-creeping, which renders this species somewhat
awkward to manage when grown with others in a collection of less rampant
habit. On the other hand, the disposition it has to spread might very
well be taken advantage of by providing it with a good broad space, than
which nothing could be more lovely for two months of the year.

It is needless to give directions for its propagation, as the runners
spring up all round the parent plant. Slugs are very fond of it, and in
early spring, especially when the new growths are appearing, they should
be kept in check, otherwise they will eat down into the heart of the
strongest plant; a dose of clear lime water will be found effective and
will not hurt the new leaves; if this is followed up with a few
sprinklings of sand, the slugs will not care to occupy such unpleasant
quarters.

Flowering period, May and June.

Anemone Vernalis.

SHAGGY WINDFLOWER; _Nat. Ord._ RANUNCULACEAE.

A curious but pretty alpine species, from the Swiss Alps, consequently
very hardy. It is not a showy subject, but its distinctions are really
beautiful, and commend it to those who love to grow plants of a
_recherche_ character.

The illustration (Fig. 12) will give some idea of it, but no description
can convey even an approximate notion of its flowers, which are produced
singly, on short