RHIPSALIS. 
347 
RHODANTHE. 
with large handsome leaves and 
showy berries. ‘These berries when 
unripe are used for making a yellow 
dye, and they are sold for this pur- 
pose in the colour shops, under the 
name of French berries ; when ripe, 
their juice mixed with alum forms 
what is called sapgreen; and if 
all branches; for the whole plant 
consists of a series of short round 
articulated branches, spreading in 
all directions. The flowers of this 
genus differ from those of the Cacti 
generally, in being small and not 
very handsome. ‘They are general- 
ly yellow. The species should all 
they are suffered to hang on the | be grown in brick rubbish and sandy 
trees till autumn, their juice be- 
comes purple. 
ries, also used in dyeing yellow, are 
the fruit of R. infectorius, which is 
a native of France, near Avignon. 
R. saxatilis, the Stone Buckthorn, 
which is a deciduous recumbent 
species, is a valuable plant for rock- 
work, or for clothing rocks or old 
walls, where it is desirable to givea 
wild and natural appearance to the 
scenery; and R. erythroxylon, the 
Red-wooded Buckthorn, is very or- 
aamental as a tufted bush among 
rocks near water. R. frdngula, 
and R. latifolius, are low trees. 
All the species are quite hardy, and 
will grow in any common garden- 
soil, and in any situation: that is 
tolerably dry ; and they are all easi- 
ly propagated by seeds and layers. 
-Rue’x1a.— Melastom icee — Her- 
baceous and shrubby plants, natives 
of America. R. virginica, which 
is the handsomest species, is quite 
hardy im peat earth, in a moist 
The Avignon ber- | little water. 
loam, and they should have very 
The cuttings must be 
dried by laying them on a shelf for 
two or three days before they are 
planted. 
Ruopa'ntHe. — Composite. —A 
beautifal little annual plant, a na- 
tive of the Swan River, whence its 
seeds were imported by Captain 
Mangles, who so well merits the 
gratitude of every lover of flowers 
for the numerous beautiful plants 
which he has been the means of 
introducing. The Rhodanthe is 
generally treated as a half-hardy 
annual, being sown on a hot-bed in 
February and planted out in May; 
but it may be grown to an enormous 
size by the followmg treatment. 
The seed must. be sown the first 
week in April, in a soil composed 
of three parts of heath-mould and 
one of loam ; and the young plants 
pricked out the first week in May 
into small thumb pots or sixties, 
filed with a similar soil In a 
situation, and it produces its showy | week’s time they should be shifted 
pink, or rather rose-coloured flow- 
ers, with conspicuous yellow sta- 
mens, in July and August. The 
leaves are strongly ribbed as in all 
the Melastomacere, and slightly 
edged with pink. The shrubby 
species are more tender than the 
herbaceous ones, and they are gen- 
erally kept in a greenhouse. 
Rut'psais.—Cacte@.—Very cu- 
rious succulent plants, which are 
natives of both the East and West 
Indies. As the Opuntias may be 
said to be all leaves, and the dif- 
ferent kinds of tree Cereus all stem, 
so the Rhipsalis may be considered 
into pots a size larger; they should 
then be suffered to remain a fort- 
night, after which they should again 
be shifted into larger pots and the 
blossom-buds pinched off. This 
shifting may be repeated five or six 
times, always pinching off the blos- 
som-bnds, till the plant has attained 
a large size and shrubby character, 
which will generally be about the 
middle of August, and when it may 
be permitted to flower. A plant 
which had been treated in this man- 
ner, and which was given to me 
by Captain Mangles, measured a 
foot and a half high, and four feet 
