andsome double-red and white varieties. Since his
time the number of species and varieties has been largely increased by
the addition of the Chinese and Japanese species, and by the labours of
the French nurserymen, who have paid more attention to the flower than
the English.

In the hardy flower garden there is no more showy family than the Paeony.
They have flowers of many colours, from almost pure white and pale
yellow to the richest crimson; and they vary very much in their foliage,
most of them having large fleshy leaves, "not much unlike the leaves of
the Walnut tree," but some of them having their leaves finely cut and
divided almost like the leaves of Fennel (_P. tenuifolia_). They further
vary in that some are herbaceous, disappearing entirely in winter, while
others, Moutan or Tree Paeonies, are shrubs; and in favourable seasons,
when the shrub is not injured by spring frosts, there is no grander
shrub than an old Tree Paeony in full flower.

Of the many different species the best are the Moutans, which, according
to Chinese tradition, have been grown in China for 1500 years, and which
are now produced in great variety of colour; P. corallina, for the
beauty of its coral-like seeds; P. Cretica, for its earliness in
flowering; P. tenuifolia, single and double, for its elegant foliage; P.
Whitmaniana, for its pale yellow but very fleeting flowers, which,
before they are fully expanded, have all the appearance of immense
Globe-flowers (_trollius_); P. lobata, for the wonderful richness of its
bright crimson flowers; and P. Whitleji, a very old and very double form
of P. edulis, of great size, and most delicate pink and white colour.

FOOTNOTES:

[211:1]

"Which to outbarre, with painful pyonings,
From sea to sea, he heapt a mighty mound!"

SPENSER, _F. Q._, ii, 10, 46.

[211:2] The name was variously spelt, _e.g._--

"And other trees there was mane one
The Pyany, the Poplar, and the Plane."

_The Squyr of Lowe Degre_, 39.

"The pretie Pinke and purple Pianet."

CUTWODE, _Caltha Poetarum_, 1599, st. 24.

"A Pyon (Pyion A.) dionia, herba est."--_Catholicon Anglicum._

PIPPIN, _see_ APPLE.

PLANE.

_Daughter._

I have sent him where a Cedar,
Higher than all the rest, spreads like a Plane
Fast by a brook.