I had in my row Blanche Moreau, an exquisite paper white, Maître Soisons, another beautiful white, and the crested and deep purple Deuil de Paul Fontaine. How delicious they all were! Just a little sticky, perhaps, but very sweet; especially an old cottage pink variety that I was given from a garden at Harley, and the name of which I have never known. The kind donor, an old dame, I remember, told me, when she gave me a cutting and I pressed for the name, that it hadn't no name as far as she knew, but that she called it her "double sweetness," for it was to her nose, she affirmed, "honey and candy in one." Then I noted, bursting into bloom on the other side of the path, rows of Chinese Delphiniums of all colours, that Burbidge had raised from some seed sent to me from a lovely Scotch garden in the far north. The blossoms were of all colours. There were some of an exquisite watery tender turquoise blue, some deep blue de Marie, and others, a faint and celestial tint, as of the sky on soft February days. Besides these there were opal twilights, and darkest indigoes. I paused and looked down the Ercal gravel path, and stood gazing at my forests of peonies. The English ones were over, but round the clematises were masses of the Chinese sorts. They were of all colours--crimson, carmine, white, purple, cream, pink, rose. How wonderfully beautiful they were, what satiny pinks, what splendid roses, what creamy whites! In the borders I noticed a few plants of the beautiful tree or Moutan peony, the most glorious kind of all, but which had flowered rather earlier. My plants as yet were small, but "Elisabeth" had had one blossom of deepest scarlet. And I was led to hope that Athlete, Comte de Flandres, and Lambertiana would be strong enough next year to be allowed to flower. A few steps beyond I paused to look at my Austrian briar hedge, which was then literally, a line of flame in my garden. It was a glorious note of colour, and planted next to the hedge were patches of purple peonies. What a beautiful contrast the two made! one that Sandro Botticelli loved. Then I made my way to a bed of hybrid teas.