My question was directed at Harry Rhodes, my junior-school teacher, who was passionate about both groups of plants and who would raise them in the little greenhouse in his back garden to sell at the church bazaar in the 1950s. They were all the same price: sixpence a pot.
By growing a range in pots, we can bring the world to our doorstep
His reply was swift and concise: ‘Well, all cacti are succulents, but not all succulents are cacti.’ He must have noticed my furrowed brow. ‘The succulents that have spines we call cacti; the ones without we just call… succulents.’
The matter was settled—and so was my fondness for a group of plants that began then, at the age of nine, with a single potted specimen bought from Mr Rhodes. Its label (a scrubbed and neatly inscribed lollipop stick) bore the legend Bryophyllum pinnatum. It was a liver-spotted succulent with tiny little plantlets along the edges of its leaves. Brilliant!
For half my weekly pocket money (a shilling) I had 30 or 40 plants rather than one, as the tiny plantlets rooted with ease in other pots of sandy compost. Within a month, I could have had my own plant stall at the church bazaar. Since then, my gratitude to Mr Rhodes has never faded.
Denne historien er fra July 08, 2020-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra July 08, 2020-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
