Our parks and gardens are full of much-loved flowers from China. We owe their presence to a group of men who devoted their lives, and sometimes sacrificed them, to saving souls but also delighted in discovering a wealth of ornamental plants
China’s remote heartland was the destination of hundreds of young European missionaries in the nineteenth century. They found themselves in a region that contained one of the richest and most varied floras in the world. Many of the missionaries were enthusiastic botanists fascinated by the astonishing vegetation surrounding their villages. Some of the plants they discovered still resonate with gardeners: Davidia involucrata, Buddleja davidii, Osmanthus delavayi, Paeonia delavayi, Fargesia nitida, Paulownia fargesii, Rosa soulieana &hel
17 December 2014, The Tablet
Growing in faith
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