210 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ September IS, 1863. 



all the leav(?3 that chote up the centres of the plants, leav-in^ 

 only these which are fi-esh and healthy-looking about the 

 points of the shoots. If allowed to remain in the bed tUl 

 the usual time of lifting such plants, the majority of the 

 leaves of the v.arlegated sorts named \vill have assumed a 

 somewhat sickly appearance, and these, and all that would 

 be likely to di-oop and decay about the plants, shoidd be re- 

 moved at once before beginning to pot. It is not advisable to 

 cut or jjrune back the stems, because they are apt to die back 

 and cause decay at the main stem of the plants. When we 

 want to pnme such plants they are allowed to make roots, 

 and show indications of active life first, and this is not 

 generally the case tUl after the turn of the year. They may 

 then be cut Ijack, if dwarf plants be the object, and they 

 will sooa break at the eyes left, and the tops may be made 

 into cuttings, which strike fi-eely in heat in February. They 

 may either be put singly into five and si^-inch pots accord- 

 ing to the size of the plants, or several plants may be put 

 into larger j)ots. The roots should not be pruned beyond 

 cutting back any strong, straggling ones. The soil with 

 which to pot them should be of equal parts loam and well 

 decayed leaf mould, with about a sixth part of sand, all well 

 mixed together and passed through a tlu-ee-quarter meshed 

 sieve. Drain tlie pots well, and in potting see that the roots 

 are well distributed amongst the soil, not bundled into 

 the pot and some soil pressed on the top of them as we have 

 often seen. The soU should be pressed ftrmly about the roots. 

 When potted give the plants a watering through a fine rose 

 sufficient to wet the whole soil, and place them in a light 

 airy part of your- greenhouse. The system of crowding them 

 together in any close fi-ame or house, and keejiing them 

 close and shaded, should be avoided as much as possible : it 

 is attended with damping and decaying, and is entirely 

 opposed to the natiu-e and constitution of Geraniums. 

 Through the winter they should just have water enough to 

 keep them fi.-om shi-iveUing, and very little indeed wiU be 

 sufficient for this. It is a good plan to cover the surface of 

 the pot with di-y materi.al, such as charred refuse or very 

 dry fine mould, immediately they are watered at potting 

 time. This prevents evaporation and the necessity for fi-e- 

 quent watering, which is undesh-able. All damp leaves and 

 shoots should be removed, as soon as they appear, through- 

 out the winter. 



If you can introduce them into a gentle heat about the 

 middle of February, they wiU soon grow and make nice 

 bushy plants that wOl look well in tlie greenhouse for a 

 wlule before planting-out tmie. But unless potted early, 

 and put into a house with fire heat for a whUe in autumn, 

 you must not expect them to look very well in your green- 

 house in winter, the variegated sorts in particular. But 

 Christine being a very hardy Geranium wiU sooner recover 

 the shock, and by careful lifting and a slight degree of fire 

 heat after being potted wiU soon look fi-esh and nice. 



The Geranium cuttings are not left in eight-inch pots tUl 

 bedded-out, but are potted singly in three and four-inch 

 pots, according to the size of the young plants. This is 

 done in February, and when a little heat can be afforded 

 them after potting, they will the sooner make fine plants, 

 but they^are left no longer in heat than just to give them a 

 start. It was simply the "autumn propagation" and 

 winter management that were treated of in the article you 

 refer to, and after they are rooted the common Scarlets are 

 treated the same as the variegated sorts. They are all 

 potted-off into single pots in spring, although I have fre- 

 quently planted them from the pots they were rooted in ; 

 but this course has never been followed except from neces- 

 sity, either for want of room or pots — disadvantages which 

 I am not called to cope with now. Geraniums will do 

 very well shaken out of the cutting-pots and planted in 

 the beds in the end of Llay, but they never bloom so freely 

 as nice rustling plants that have been a mouth or two in 

 single pots, and not crowded together; and shaken-out 

 plants are much later in making a display of bloom. — D. T.] 



nut refuse on the beds, and last week the beds, to my as- 

 tonishment, began to produce Mushrooms among the 

 Cucumbers. — Lex. 



MusHEooMS. — I do not think any one need despair of 

 ultimately obtaining Mushrooms because his bed does not 

 bear in the customary six or eight weeks ; for I made up 

 two beds in frames last Januaiy, and they never produced 

 a Mushroom. I then grew Cucumbers in loam and cocoa- 



THE GLADIOLUS AND ITS DISEASE. 



I KNOW of a certain Horticultural Society, whose members, 

 not contented with dry formal •ommittee meetings, used to 

 have occasionally a more social gathering ; and it is said 

 that whenever there was a flagging in the conversation some 

 one woidd begin to talk about this flower, and immediately 

 controversy sharp and strong would spring up as to the 

 proper quantity of its syllables. I do not believe to this 

 day that it is settled — indeed I know but very lately it was 

 proposed to refer it to Dr. Todd, one of the Fellows of 

 Trinity College. Whether The Journal of Horticultuke 

 wiU be more successful with its readers I do not know ; but 

 I hope its Editors will forgive me if I call in question their 

 ex cathedra dictum on the point, for of the three methods 

 of pronunciation that which they have fathered seems to 

 me the most untenable. Gladiolus is unquestionablj' a dimi- 

 nutive form o( ijladbi.s, a sword, and as a rule all derivatives 

 ai'e short — e.g., fides makes fidicfda; nutrix, nutriciila ; and, 

 more to the point, filius, a son, makes filiolus. Then, again, 

 one vowel before another is short, so that Gladiolus woidd 

 be even more correct ; but I think all analogy is in favour 

 of the pronunciation being Gladiolus. As to the first 

 syllable, that, too, should be pronounced, I fancy, shortly — 

 glud, not gliide ; but I do hope the Editors wiU withdraw 

 their sanction to such a barbarism as GladUus. 



As to the more serious matter of the disease which has 

 manifested itself in the bulb in various places, I wish I 

 could give positive information or suggest a certain remedy. 

 My own experience on the point is, I am happy to say, 

 " nil ;" for my small collection of some two or three hundred 

 bulbs is almost, if not altogether, free from it. The question 

 seems to me much in the same condition as the Potato 

 disease, to which it bears a striking similarity, when every- 

 thing from electricity down to Smee's Aphis vastator was 

 considered to be the cause of it. Let us look at the data 

 which we have — 



1. This is not the first season of its appearance. Some 

 collections sufi'ered largely last year ; so that we must not, 

 I think, in seeking for causes lay too much stress on the 

 exceptional character of the present season. 



2. It is prevalent on the continent as well as in England, 

 though I do not know whether to the same extent : there- 

 fore om- cUmate must not be charged with it, as is too often 

 the case. 



3. It seems to be more prevalent on heavy than on light 

 soils. Mr. Standish is fi'ee from it in the light peaty soil 

 of Ascot ; and so is Mr. YoueU, whose soil approaches closely, 

 I believe, to that of Holland. In my own Light, friable, but 

 rich soil I have hardly seen a trace of it, while fi-om heavy 

 lands and on the London clay it seems to be very severe.* 



4. The plan of leaving the roots in the ground advocated 

 by some, and suggested by yom- correspondent " R. T. E., 

 Shrev)shury,^^ as a probable remedy, does not seem to answer, 

 as your correspondent " T. H. C., Walsall," says that it 

 was only those left in the gTound that exhibited this ten- 

 dency. 



5. Potting the bulbs and then jilanting them out is no 

 jirotection ag.ainst it, as my friend Mr. Andrew Henderson 

 told me that that was the system adopted by Iris fii'm this 

 year, and that their beds had totally failed. 



Such are a few of the facts which have been brought 

 forward, and although by no means sufficient to form an 

 accirrate judgment from, they ai'e enough to make a pro- 

 bable one; but as this fiower is now become so much in 

 vogue, and is so great an addition to oui' autumn flowers, 

 it woidd be most desirable that those gi-owers of it who are 

 readers of The Journai. of Horticulture should send in a 

 statement of their own experience, where they obtained their 

 bulbs fi'om, the nature of the soU, situation, mode of treat- 

 ment, and results. I happened to meet my friend, M. Charles 

 Verdier, at the Crystal Palace Autumn Show the other day 

 (where the paucity of exhibitors in this flower told the tale 



* I know this is contrary to "H.'s" experience in tlie "Florist and 

 Poniologist,'" piige 123 j but he gives no instances, and it is not so in the 

 cases I know. 



