298 THE FLOKAL WORLD AND GAKDEN GUIDE. 



If the following are sown at once, and the directions attended 

 to, the result will afford the grower much pleasurable satisfaction. 

 The best plan will be to get together a quantity of 48-size or five-inch 

 pots, and a lot of crocks ; and both pots and crocks should be clean. 

 Almost any kind of mould will do, so long as it is not sour from 

 frequent using, or by having any impure vegetable matter mixed 

 with it. Let it be passed through a coarse sieve. The rough por- 

 tions will do to use as drainage, by placing it over the crocks before 

 you add the mould. It is better to add some silver-sand — say about 

 an eighth part to the whole — incorporating it well with the mould, 

 to assist to keep it in a state of purity and porous. In filling your 

 pots, let it be to within about half an inch of the rim. When you 

 have sown the seeds, place the pots in the shade till you observe the 

 seeds vegetating, when at once remove them to the light near the 

 glass. If you fail to adopt this precaution, no after-treatment will 

 remedy the evil, because neglect in the first instance causes them to 

 grow slender and weakly. As soon as you can, thin them out, but 

 not finally, so that you may afterwards have recourse to a second 

 thinning. The thinnings may be carefully potted, if you have not 

 enough in pots already. 



Nemophila insigxis. — I have grown this well-known but 

 beautiful annual in pots for several years for ornamenting the 

 greenhouse in the spring. At one time, when prizes were offered 

 for the best collection of annuals in pots at the spring exhibition of a 

 local show, I have had only one plant cultivated in an eight-inch pot. 

 Its size, and the largeness of the flower, produced a fiue effect, as it 

 was trained to several sticks, in every way the same as a pelar- 

 gonium. It well repays to grow it thus by frequent shifts ; it is 

 only the idea of its being a common annual that deters us, and not 

 its lack of beauty. For ordinary purposes, three good plants allowed 

 to remain in a 48-size pot will suffice. A part of the plant as it 

 grows may be trained to sticks, and the other allowed to hang over 

 the pot. They are seen to great advantage when suspended in 

 baskets, or otherwise, from the roof of the conservatory, their shoots 

 trailing downwards. They are very subject to attacks of the green- 

 fly ; keep them free from this pest, or it will soon weaken the energies 

 of the plant. There are other varieties of this annual, with colours 

 on white grounds, and speckled, affording a nice change, but they 

 are nothing like so showy, or so thriving and robust in habit as 

 ]¥. insignis. 



Colliksta bicolor. — This by judicious management can be 

 grown into a fine specimen for spring decoration, and produce 

 splendid racemes of flowers of two colours combined, purple and 

 white. One plant in each pot, if they are very strong, would be 

 sufficient; otherwise two or three, according to their respective 

 strength. I have grown them to a size that they required eight and 

 nine-inch pots for their final shift. Let the central shoot or stem be 

 carefully trained as it grows, and the others as they need ; but in 

 doing so, guard against their snapping by first attaching them to 

 the main stem or stalk by short ties of bast. 



Candytuft, or Iberis. — The purple and white Rocket Candy- 



