There
are any varied explanations for the common name of Digitalis
- and indeed, about why a fox might need a glove (save
to pad about secretly at night) - but the whatever the
reasons for its naming, the foxglove was in Victorian
times, as it remains now, one of the favourites of the
garden.
In
the garden Hibberd advised that the foxglove should
never be planted in dry, breezy or starving situation.
A fernery, or a snug, wild corner hidden away, were
its perfect positions. The rockery at Kew had a splendid
display in its rockery that during the late nineteenth
century was apparently quite remarkable.
To
raise a stock of plants, the seeds should be planted
in April or May in pan or boxes, the young plants then
having a little nursing in frames,
being planted out in the garden one they were large
enough. Seeds should be planted every year for, while
a foxglove might flower for two or even three seasons,
a considerable portion of them never flowered once past
their first season.
