THE FLOEAL WOELD AND OAEDEN GUIDE. 



12 7 



house for the purpose. When these 

 are beginning to look seedy they will 

 all be removed, and we shall have 

 rows of Christine geraniums at all the 

 vpindows, and there will be flowers 

 enough for some months to come. 

 Now, just the same succession may be 

 made in beds and borders, and I am 

 setting an example that way by grow- 

 ing all sorts of things in quantities in 

 pots. Having two plots of ground 

 away from home, I can send off the 

 plants as soon as they are seedy, have 

 them repotted, plunged, and kept 

 growing for the next season with very 

 little trouble, keeping up the changes 

 as needful at any time, and in any 

 way that seasons and circumstances 

 require. 



You know that in my forecourt is 

 a stone jardinet of Ilansome's, that is 

 now and has been for some time as 

 fine a bed as may be seen at any time 

 of year in the best kept garden in the 

 land. It was stocked in less than 

 an hour, and can be unstocked in 

 twenty minutes, and when the plants 

 are taken out, there wUl be no hurry 

 or bother about potting them, because 

 they are potted already, and only a 

 few of them will need a shift this sea- 

 son. In the centre a fine shrub of 

 blue veronica, four feet high, in a 

 ten-inch pot ; it is full of bloom, and 

 has been out all winter ; on each side, 

 one way, a pair of large plants of 

 Cytisus Atleeana in full bloom, and 

 the other way, large plants of Die- 

 lytra spectabilis. This makes a 

 showy central clump to begin with. 

 Then, to follow all round, there 

 are three tall plants of Purple Nose- 

 gay, Hubens, and Heidii geranium, 

 smaller plants of Dielytra, large plants 

 of Farfugium grande. Four plants 

 of Yeratrum album, with their noble 

 tropical-looking foliage, and between 

 several large plants of Hotteia Ja- 

 ponica (commonly known as Spirea 

 Japonica), smothered with spikes of 

 snow-white, around these again small 

 plants of Imperial Crimson geranium, 

 and to finish off" all round ferns and 

 seedling CupressusLawsoniana. They 

 are packed so close, and the large- 

 leaved plants 80 placed, that not a 

 single pot can be discerned except by 

 stooping and looking for them. The 



reader will call this blowing hot and 

 cold with the same breath, but it is 

 not so. Though geraniums make this 

 mixed clump very gay, they are not 

 bedded but in the pots they wintered 

 in, and you know how strong and 

 early they bloom when they have had 

 no shift in autumn or spring. 



All these geraniums were from 

 cuttings last June. The cuttings were 

 potted separately in thumb-pots, and 

 put under glass ; when rooted, they 

 were shifted to 60 size, in strong 

 turfy loam, then to 48 size, and thus 

 they got rather pot-bound before 

 winter, and now show as much flower 

 as leaf. In July next they will be 

 first pruned for cuttings, and next be 

 shaken out and repotted, and next 

 spring they will bloom again very 

 early and most profusely. In a very 

 short time the weather will be warm 

 enough for fuchsias in bloom to be 

 put out without danger, then the bed 

 will be changed and filled as close as 

 it will pack with potted fuchsias, but 

 if they were put out now, they would 

 immediately drop their blooms and 

 be more shabby in the middle of June 

 than they were in the middle of Feb- 

 ruary. But suppose I could not have 

 spared these plants to put out at such 

 a risk, then I should have filled the 

 bed with a large centre of Alyssum 

 saxatile and a broad ring outside of 

 Aubrietia purpurea, and this last has 

 bloomed this season more profusely 

 than I ever saw it before ; some of 

 the old clumps have been one mass of 

 rosy purple for six weeks past, and it 

 has for companion Iberis sempervi- 

 rens and Iberis corresefolia, the two 

 best early white flowering hardy 

 plants known. The last is tallied 

 cornifolia in some catalogues, which 

 is a mistake. 



Among the good old scarlet gera- 

 niums there is one called Attraction, 

 which is rarely seen, and still moi'e 

 rarely talked about. It has been 

 many times recommended in these 

 pages, and is mentioned now to give 

 it another chance of popularity, as 

 exactly ten times more valuable than 

 Tom Thumb, and in some respects 

 superior to Crystal Palace scarlet. I 

 have put out the last batch of Tom 

 Thumb I shall ever make room for ; 



