33^ Bulletin 147. 



them. But specimen plants and standards* are far less frequent, 

 proportionately, in America. It is partly because of higher-priced 

 labor, and partly because we do not like them so well as Europeans 

 do. Figures 174 and 179 illustrate two types of bush plant that may 

 be raised at home in a six- inch pot. 



4. Do you want a few chrysanthemums in your window with the 

 least trouble and expense ? Then you had better aim either at ideal 

 2, or else have your own way and make the best of what you get. 

 Most people will not repot their plants in successively larger sizes, and 

 they are afraid to disbud or do not believe in it. In such cases they 

 can only hope for a goodly number of flowers that look well enough 

 at a distance and make a brave show of color, but the beauty of form 

 is largely lost. Size and form are the products of disbudding. 

 Everybody has some color sense, but the conscious pleasure in form 

 is a later development. However, it ought to be said that imperfecdy 

 blown flowers of chrysanthemums often have a beauty in mass effect. 

 They are rarely painful, as is a partially blown dahlia. This is prob- 

 ably because the fully-developed flower in one case is loose and free, 

 while in the other it is often set and formal. 



Whatever ideal is chosen, the best way to begin, in general, is to 

 buy a young plant of the florist. Young plants of any size from two 

 to twelve inches in height can usually be had at any time from March 

 to July I. Trust to the florist for the variety, unless you have made a 

 memorandum at the flower-show or elsewhere of the desirable varieties, 

 or unless you wish to reproduce some of the effects pictured in Cornell 

 Experiment Station Bulletins 91, 112, 136 or 147. In general, dwarf, 

 short-jointed varieties are best for the window-garden. Probably 

 most people will prefer to buy their plants in May, or early June, plant 

 them outdoors in boxes and remove them bodily indoors a! the 

 approach of frost. It is possible to plant them in the open ground for 

 the summer, take them up carefully in the autumn, and then put them 

 into flower pots. The box method, however, avoids the shock of 

 transplanting. It is not necessary to buy flower pots of graded sizes. 

 Old soap boxes will do very well, although not handsome or as good 

 as pots ; but tin cans are too small, and transplanting from them is 



*A "standard" is a plant Avitli many branches at the top of a single, 

 .stout, sclf-snpporting steuj, The temi is not confined to chrysanthenunn§, 



