IT is not often in the present day we meet with the crown imperial, although it is one of the "old-fashioned" flowers that were in great favour before bedding came into fashion. It is a noble flower, peculiar in character, and adapted for a style of gardening that effects a kind of compromise between the old style and the new. Having an entrance court much overshaded by large trees, and desiring to keep this court in a state of permanent but changeful gaiety, we had prepared for the purpose a series of compartments faced with handsome mouldings in Ransome's imperishable stone, and a central jardinet of the same material. In place of earth these compartments were filled with cocoanut-fibre refuse, and in this material pot plants were plunged to make ornamental groups ever varying, and always beautiful. The practice carried on through a series of years developed into what was called the "plunging system," because the pot plants were plunged in the clean brown fibre instead of being planted in open soil. The most complete success was attained in this direction, and groups of plants were grown for every season of the year, comprising hollies and ivies and other rich evergreens for the winter, and all kinds of flowering plants for other seasons. In due time a trial was made of crown imperials, and we obtained a collection of about a dozen sorts, of which we potted in the autumn about twenty bulbs of each. In an airy, cool plant-house these came into flower about a fortnight in advance of the usual time of flowering out of doors, and they proved singularly useful by reason of the brilliant green of their leafage, and the distinct tones of orange, red, and buff of their somewhat singular flowers. After the first essay we were careful never to miss a season in having a display of these flowers in connection with our plunging system.

The crown imperial is a member of the great family of lilies. The species of Fritillaria are about thirty in number, whereof only one is met with wild in England, and that but rarely. This one is the "snake's-head" fritillary (F. meleagris), of which a few years since we saw a collection of about sixty varieties in the interesting nurseries of Messrs. Krelage, in Haarlem. The grand old gardeners of the times of Elizabeth and the Stuarts thought much of the crown imperial. Parkinson commences his book of "The Garden of Pleasant Flowers" (Paradisus, p. 27) with this subject, saying--"The Crowne Imperiall for his stately beautifulness, deserveth the first place in this our garden of delight, to be here entreated of before all other Lillies;" and he devotes two pages to the description of it, taking note that "the whole plant and every part thereof, as well rootes, as leaves and flowers, doe smell somewhat strong, as it were the sauour of a foxe, so that if any doe but come neare it, he cannot but smell it, which yet is not unwholesome."

The crown imperial requires a rich deep soil and a sunny exposure. The bulbs being planted in September or October, will produce their flowers in the subsequent March and April, and will die down early enough for the occupation of the ground by summer flowers. To do justice to this noble lily, it should be abundantly fed, hence in preparing the soil for it, manure should be liberally added, and in the spring, when the stems are rising, it will be an advantage to mulch around the stems with fat old manure to feed those surface roots that appear at the base of the stems. If grown as thus advised, every bulb will produce two or three stems, and each of these will produce a large bulb. Thus the crop may be said to prove profitable without resorting to the sowing of seeds. It has been our custom, as soon as the stems were in some degree decayed, to lift the bulbs and store them in a cool place in sand, until the time for planting them again. If it is intended to raise plants from seed, it will be advisable to sow the seed as soon as ripe, at the end of May or early in June, and it will be safer to sow in pans or boxes than in the open ground.

The smaller fritillaries are better adapted for pot culture than the crown imperial, although, as remarked above, we have made a pot plant of the latter to some purpose. A very important species, because of its variations as well as its intrinsic beauty, is F. meleagris, the snake's-head lily. In "Maund's Botanic Garden" (vi. 215) we are informed that as many as four distinct varieties may be obtained; but, as remarked above, we have seen at least sixty in one garden in Haarlem, and these varied so much that their specific identity was a matter of question with a party of experts, until Mr. H. Krelage himself gave the assurance that they were veritable seedlings of F. meleagris. Mr. Niven, in his edition of "Maund," figures the multiplex variety, which has a perianth of many segments, the colour rosy purple, with light and dark spots.