The polyanthus narcissi, carrying their many flowers in heads at the top
of the stalk, are what is termed half hardy and they are more frequently
seen in florists' windows than in gardens. I have found them hardy if
planted in a sheltered spot, covered with slanted boards and leaves,
which should not be removed before April, as the spring rain and
winds, I am convinced, do more to kill the species than winter cold. The
flowers are heavily fragrant, like gardenias, and are almost too sweet
for the house; but they, together with violets, give the garden the
opulence of odour before the lilacs are open, or the heliotropes that
are to be perfumers-in-chief in summer have graduated from thumb pots in
the forcing houses.
[Illustration: THE POET'S NARCISSUS.]
Unless one has a large garden and a gardener who can plant and tend
parterres of spring colour, I do not set much value upon outdoor
hyacinths; they must be lifted each year and often replaced, as the
large bulbs soon divide into several smaller ones with the flowers
proportionately diminished. To me their mission is, to be grown in pots,
shallow pans, or glasses on the window ledge, for winter and spring
comforters, and I use the early tulips much in the same way, except for
a cheerful line of them, planted about the foundation of the house, that
when in bloom seems literally to lift home upon the spring wings of
resurrection!
All my tulip enthusiasm is centred in the late varieties, and chief
among these come the fascinating and fantastic "parrots.
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