TRAVEL IN A GARDEN: The Brassica tribe in the Winter Garden of Frances Jane Hope.

Saturday, March 2, 2019

The Brassica tribe in the Winter Garden of Frances Jane Hope.

"Will you permit me to offer a few practical remarks on the subject of that great desideratum, a Winter Flower Garden?"

"A Winter Garden must last for seven months..." continues Frances Jane Hope (d. 1880), Scottish plantswoman of Wardie Lodge, near Edinburgh, explaining her dedication to this neglected subject.
She sums up fourteen years of experiments, trials, failures and findings in an article written for the Gardener's Chronicles in February 1863.

She describes her Winter Garden:

"The Beds are on Grass, 35 in number, the Largest 23 feet by 71/2, and a Circle, of 13 feet diameter, and the Smallest Circles, of 51/2 feet diameter. There is in each Bed, a Centre of Evergreens, a Border or Ring of Colour, an Edging of Variegation, and close to the Grass, early Bulbs. Now, the article of Colour, is my strong point, to which I wish to draw attention, and to popularise."

Because, despite the use of expensive shrubs and plants, of variegated hollies, conifers, Daphnes, Berberis, Ericas and edges of Cineraria maritima, Santolina, pinks and alyssum,

"Colour, in the common acceptation of the word, is wanting, until the Crocuses bloom; and for the dead months, it must be so, unless you employ, the various varieties of the Brassica tribe. By the use of these, you obtain every shade, from the darkest Purple of the Siberian, to the vivid Magenta, Mauve, and Rose of the Borecoles, and also, pure, and yellow, White. All other Green looks dead, when compared with the lively growing Green of the German Kale, and in the unhearted, Dutch Cabbage, the various shades of Purple and Red, combined with rich bloom, have a very telling effect, in large Centre beds."

In a subsequent article, she details her choices for the Colour Borders: a limited number of evergreens, Aucuba japonica, Rhododendron ponticum and buxus, and many varieties "of Brassica oleracea: Bed Dutch Cabbage, Triple Curled Borecole, White and Green Variegated, Purple Variegated, Purple, or Russian Borecole,- arranged in different ways— one, two, or three colours ; Bed, Purple, White, and Green, alternate or mixed ; the Beds in pairs, generally."

drawings: Cauliflowers: The Half-Early Paris, Long Island Beauty, Extra-Early Dwarf Erfurt

She writes again about Winter Gardens for the Gardeners' Chronicles in January 1874.
"The special characteristics of our Winter Garden are Cheapness, Colour and Variety", she states and with the confidence of twenty-five year experience and the pride of a job well done, ignoring expensive conifers and imported bulbs, she writes her last praise to the Brassica tribe.

"Now, I have finished, once for all, about the Kales; they have, for above twenty years, Beautified,

(no other word suits,) our Winter Beds, and given us, and all our Garden Friends, enjoyment. They have turned those Winter foes, (as many consider them) — Fogs, Mists, Hoar Frosts, and Sleet, into effects, for pleasure, and study, in Gardens; effects, that are generally to be observed in perfection, only, in Glens, and by Burn-sides.

"Frosted Silver," and "Diamonds," are expletives, I hear, used in connection, with Winter effects, on our Kales, but as Silver is not frosted, nor do Diamonds sparkle, au naturel but as both must pass, through the Jeweller's hands, to do so, I prefer, to keep to plain words, and the fact, that all Varieties, of Winter Weather, add varied beauties, to these Kales, — beauties, which, without them, would be unnoticed, in the Flower Garden."