stoutish scape;
they are of a deep-bluish purple, with a yellow eye; the divisions of
the corolla are flat and lobed; calyx nearly as long as tube, and
ventricose or unevenly swollen. The whole flower is much less than _P.
farinosa_. The leaves are also smaller than those of that species;
obovate, lanceolate, denticulate, and very mealy underneath.

To grow it requires not only a light but somewhat spongy soil, as peat
and sand, but it should never be allowed to get dry at the roots; a top
dressing during summer of sand and half decayed leaves is a great help
to it, for the roots are not only then very active, going deep and
issuing from the base of the leaves, but they require something they can
immediately grow into when just forming, and to be protected from
drought. It will be well to remember that its principal habitats are on
the sandy shores, as that gives a proper idea of the bottom moisture,
and, from the looseness of the sand, the drier condition of the
immediate surface. My specimens have always dwindled during summer and
failed to appear the following spring, excepting where such treatment as
the above has been adopted. I am much indebted for these hints to
several amateurs, who grow it well. That many fail with it is evidenced
by the facts that it is in great demand every spring and that there are
few sources of supply other than its wild home. Never was it more sought
for, perhaps, than at the present time, not only by amateurs at home,
but by both private and trade growers abroad. The exquisite beauty of
this primrose when well grown and the technical care required to have it
in that condition are both things of which any plant lover may be proud.

If once established, its propagation is scarcely an affair of the
cultivator's; the self-sown seed appears to germinate with far more
certainty when left alone, and, as the plants are always very small,
they hardly need to be transplanted. If left alone, though they are
often much less than an inch across, many will flower the first season.
Some have taken it as something of a biennial character. The treatment
is at fault when it gives cause for such impressions; its perennial
quality is both authorised and proved under cultivation.

Flowering period, March to May.

Primula Sikkimensis.

_Nat. Ord._ PRIMULACEAE.

[Illustration: FIG. 78. PRIMULA SIKKIMENSIS.

(Plant, one-sixth natural size; _a,_ blossom, two-thirds natural size.)]

The specific