46 I'HH PIvANT WORLD 



and at the present time bear from one to several flowers. Have any of 

 our readers had similar experience in handling callas ? 



Paper White Narcissus. — We have been asked as to the disposition of 

 these plants after they are through blooming. If it is desired to keep 

 them after blooming it would be best to plant them at first in earth, but 

 this may be done after they have been forced in water, but they are never 

 as satisfactory for the second blooming, and as they are so cheap it is best 

 to throw them away. The trouble of caring for them for a year, to- 

 gether with the usually poor reward, makes it hardly worth while. It is 

 perhaps scarcely necessary to state that a succession of these flowers may 

 be had by starting them at intervals of two weeks. 



A Curious Begonia. — A begonia of rather common cultivation is 

 Begonia phyllomanica, a native of Brazil, with stems 2 or 3 feet high 

 and obliquely-cordate light-green leaves 4 to 6 inches in length, these 

 being fringed , and somewhat laciniate on the margin . The flowers are pale 

 pink in color and borne in profusion. Its chief interest, however, lies 

 in its tendency to produce innumerable minute plantlets on the stems, 

 petioles, and more especially the upper surface of the leaves. A small 

 plant in my greenhouse has several of the leaves with the upper surface 

 almost concealed by the little plantlets. This plant makes a luxuriant 

 growth, and stands the temperature and conditions of an ordinary dwelling 

 house very well, although it is not nearly so decorative as many other 

 varieties. 



Geraniums from Seed. — Although geraniums (pelargoniums) are very 

 easily propagated from cuttings, it is also easy to grow them from seed. 

 The seeds, which are half an inch or more long and very narrow and ir- 

 regular, should be barely covered with very fine, sifted soil and kept 

 moist but not wet. They germinate in about two weeks and when the 

 plants have grown two or three leaves they should be pricked out and 

 potted. If started early in the spring they may be planted out during 

 the summer and grown on for winter blooming. Most of the plants 

 grown from seed will be common kinds, but it is very interesting to 

 watch them come into bloom and occasionally a really fine new variety 

 may be chanced upon. The weakly plants are more liable to prove val- 

 uable in the end, as the strongest usually belong to the robust varieties. 



Pansies in the Washington Parks. — For the parks in this city, pansy 

 seed is sown in August, and by the last of October or the first of 

 November the plants are 1 or 2 inches high. They are then put in the 

 beds where they are to bloom. Unless the season is an unusually severe 

 one they come through with little or no loss, and start as soon as the warm 

 days of spring come. Several thousand plants are often placed in a single 

 bed and prove very effective, especially when made up of mixed colors 

 without formal grouping. 



