NOVKMBER. 245 



careful attentions, is every season perpetrated amontz; his bedding- 

 stock. With inferior management how much is the evil augmented ! 



The daily increasing demand on the head and hands of the 

 gardener as winter approaches often delays the due attention to 

 propagating matters until weeks after they should have been com- 

 pleted. These delays involve much subsequent vexation and dis- 

 appointment, and which are purchased, too, at the expense of no 

 mean amount of labour, and from these causes. 



Cuttings, if required to produce healthy, sturdy plants, cannot 

 be chosen with too much attention to their soundness and perfect 

 organisation. It is true, certainly, that almost every portion of 

 many j)lants will produce a duplicate. But then such plants ! 

 You may, for the sake of argument, parody a line from a well- 

 known satire, and insist that 



" A plant's a plant, although there's no strength in it." 



But few persons will insist that there are not various degrees of 

 constitutional vigour in plants as in animals. And I hold it to be 

 equally true, that to expect the same degree of perfection in differ- 

 ently-constituted plants, of the same species even, is as futile as to 

 suppose that all men are capable of a like degree of intellect or 

 physical display. There is a homely proverb that teaches us not 

 to expect success in attempting the manufacturing process of con- 

 verting a sow's ear into a silk purse. 



Little less hopeless is that of attempting a high degree of develop- 

 ment with weakly constitutions or diseased plants ; and plethoric 

 or half-ripened cuttings are not the kind of shoots to produce healthy 

 ones. I am aware that the truth of these remarks is not universally 

 admitted ; yet I believe them to be correct, and to demand a much 

 greater attention than is given to them. 



But, independent of other considerations, cuttings procured from 

 the open borders late in autumn are, as a general rule, deficient in 

 the necessary qualities for producing plants capable of combating 

 the untoward influences of winter, even when good accommodation 

 can be aflTorded them. And when it is otherwise, which it must 

 be confessed is the rule rather than the exception, the result is still 

 worse. In fine, too much attention to the selection of proper cut- 

 tings cannot possibly be paid. By exercising due discrimination, 

 time and labour are economised, and the results reaped are more 

 satisfactory. 



As the greater number of bedding-out plants have to be wintered 

 in their cutting-pots, a considerable share of attention should be 

 given to render them in a condition to withstand damp and frott. 

 Growth during the winter months should not be aimed at ; to retain 

 them in good health is all that is required. Before placing them in 

 their winter quarters, they should be placed under such condition 

 as will enable them to become ripened and well established at root ; 

 and when finally stored, all immature growths should be removed 

 with a sharp knife, and any diseased or weakly plants destroyed. 

 Nor should the young plants be allowed to crowd each other too 



