66 



THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



grown on a wall, or as a border shrub, 

 this scarcely requires any pruning. But 

 ■when grown in a pot it must be pruned 

 in Novercber, or when the flowers begin 

 to show colour. Prune away the greater 

 part of the previous year's growth, say 

 two-thirds, so as to save all the wood on 

 ■which there are flower-buds. The time 

 to repot is when the flowering is over. 

 Plants on walls will want occasional 

 thinning, and the best way will be to 

 thin out to the base, every year, a few of 

 the oldest shoots, so as to keep the plant 

 always renewing itself from the collar. 

 It is one of the most useful of all known 

 ■window plants, flowering at a season 

 when a window flower is most prized, 

 and needing only the shelter of a cool 

 greenhouse or frame until transferred to 

 the window to bloom. 

 Shadt Garden. — W.P., Blackburn.— Hhe 

 best ferns for your shady garden are 

 Lady fern, common Lastrea, Royal Os- 

 mund, Blechnum spicant, common poly- 

 pody, hart's-tongue, holly-leavtd prickly 

 fern, and Onoclea sensibilis. You may 

 grow common auriculas, polyanthuses, 

 pansies, primroses, periwinkle, and, in 

 fact, most of the hardy border flowers 

 there. By referring back, you will see 

 many notes on shady borders. If you 

 want a few choice things, plant the 

 variegated Japanese honeysuckle to 

 train along the margin, variegated 

 periwinkle, Alexandrian laurel (Ruscus 

 Alexandrinus), Farfugium grande, and 

 any of the variegated Funkias, with 

 variegated white Lily, and variegated 

 Lily of the Valley. Do not move the 

 hollies ; they will do well there. 

 Various.— T. IS. P.— Your Daphne must 

 be encouraged to grow by giving plenty 

 of water, and keeping it in the warmest 

 place you have. After the end of May 

 put it out of doors, plunged to the rim 

 of the pot, where it will have the sun 

 upon it some hours every day, and there 

 let it remain till the end of October. 

 This treatment will cause it to ripen the 

 new growth, and next season it will 

 flower freely. If you send a sketch of 

 the greenhouse and place intended for 

 the forcing-house, we will endeavour to 

 advise. — Polly. — You will always be in 

 trouble with dust, etc., etc., until you 

 have a hot-water apparatus, and your 

 best plan will be a small boiler at one 

 end, and a tank at the other, so that the 

 tank would serve for a propagating bed. 

 In this case the boiler and furnace must 

 he outside, unless you could make an 

 opening at the end of the house, and set 

 the boiler into the bank of earth which 



forms the border at the back. Mr. Jones, 

 of Bankside, South wark, would solve 

 all your difficulties presently. If you 

 have a furnace inside the house, you 

 must have dust, but if it is a question 

 what is the best stove to burn inside, 

 there can be no doubt that Musgrave's is 

 unequalled. — A.B., Narberth. — No; it 

 is all moonshine to suppose any harm 

 can come of digging in frozen soil. Of 

 course frozen soil ought not to be dug in 

 when planting trees. — A.B., Acton.— 

 "What they tell you about roses is non- 

 sense. Roses on their own roots 

 will do as well in the ground as in pots, 

 in fact better. Of course, if you pot 

 them you must allow liberal pot room, 

 and vise rich soil. All our plants of 

 Jules, General, Anna, Geant, etc., about 

 which we have so often written, are on 

 their own roots. — T. S.— Better have 

 a good slope for the lights of your 

 frames, in order to catch t -ie morning 

 sun, and prevent drip inside. The frames 

 intended for cucumbers must be deep 

 enough, or the leaves will get injured by 

 pressing against the light, say seven 

 inches in the front and eighteen at the 

 back. You had better have one-brick 

 wall below gr mnd, half-brick will he 

 too slight, and heat will go through one 

 brick readily enough. — J. H. — You 

 must go to Kew ; the best private col- 

 lection is Mr. Mongriedieu's, Forest Hill. 

 — C. A. — Probably Senecio mikaniae or 

 Poligyne suaris might answer to train 

 over your sash to screen off the sun. 

 The Chinese yam, Dioscorea battatas 

 ■would make a very pretty screen, and 

 an inch of the narrowest end of a yam 

 would he sufficient to plant for the pur- 

 pose. We cannot name your crushed 

 leaf of a plant; it may be Tritoniauvaria. 

 — N. W. — Yours is the fern-leaved pri- 

 mula, Primula sinensis filicifoli a, which 

 von will probably only obtain true by 

 applying to Messrs. E. G. Henderson and 

 Son, Wellington Road, St. John's 

 Wood.— S. W.— The garden is strictly 

 private ; if visitors were allowed, 

 literary labours, to say nothing of 

 horticultural experiments, would he 

 impossible. By the tone of your letter, 

 you seem to assume a right of entry ; 

 perhaps upon that subject it would be 

 well to consult some authority on polite 

 behaviour. Though most anxious not to 

 effend, we have long ago resolved — 

 having suffered many annoyances — that 

 people who persevere in endeavours 

 to intrude upon our privacy must be 

 dealt with in a summary way ; a polite 

 refusal they cannot understand. 



