ime--spring is the best for delphiniums--to plant in groups of light
blues, dark blues, etc. You may be undecided sometimes as to whether
you consider a plant good enough to keep or not. In this case keep it,
but mark it a "hold-over." Some plants do better the second season.
They may be sown outdoors in May, but will hardly bloom the same year.

PLANT COMBINATIONS

Many combinations may be used whereby a certain area may be made to
produce a double crop of bloom, and thus prolong the flowering season
within that area. Peonies, which are planted two and a half to three
feet apart, may have the _Lilium superbum_, the later varieties of
gladiolus, or _Hyacinth candicans_ planted in between them; the last
two should be taken up each fall as they are not hardy in all sections.
The lilies will require resetting every few years, as they travel
around in their new growth, and may invade the peony roots. These will
flower above the peony foliage. Fall is the best time to plant any
lily.

The shooting star (_Dodecatheon media_) may be planted between the
spreading dwarf plants of that admirable bell flower (_Campanula
Carpatica_). The bell flowers may be planted eighteen inches apart and,
in the spring, when the shooting stars are up and in bloom, the foliage
of the campanula is hardly in evidence, but during the summer it
occupies all the space between them.

[Illustration: There are interesting combinations of flowers not only
for succession of bloom but for simultaneous bloom, as Canterbury bells
(_Campanula medium_) and foxglove (_Digitalis_)]

After flowering, all that part of the shooting star above ground turns
brown, dies back and disappears to return again next spring.

The Virginia bluebell (_Mertensia Virginica_) is another charming plant
of the same habit, and as it is worthy of cultivation in groups, it
often becomes a question where to place it so that the bare ground it
leaves behind is not an eye-sore. Besides colonies I have established
in my ravine, where the overhanging underbrush hides its absence later
on, I grow it under large bushes of forsythia. Both bloom at the same
time and the pink buds and open blue bells of the _Mertensia_, when
seen through the fleecy mass of the golden bells of the forsythia, make
a charming picture. After flowering, the forsythia hides the disrobing
_Mertensia_ with its heavy sheet of foliage.

Some perennials--the bleeding heart and the perennial poppy--have
ragg