67 



COCCINELLA. 



main roots below it, and yet live. 

 The best kind of clothing is wheat 

 j straw, or long slips of bark ; and 

 I these ought to be spread out at the 

 I base of the trunk, so as to throw off 

 I the rain to a foot or two of distance 

 fi-om the collar. 



CoB^^A. — Cobceacece or Polemo- 

 nidcece. — C. scdndens is a climbing 

 plant of very rapid growth, and pro- 

 ducing abundance of large bell- 

 shaped flowers, which are first green, 

 but afterwards become purple. The 

 plant, if allowed plenty of room for 

 its roots, and grown in a rich sandy 

 loam, will extend along a wall or 

 trellis, thirty or forty feet, in the 

 course of a single summer. When 

 it is wanted to cover any broad 

 space, the points of the shoots should 

 be repeatedly pinched off, to make it 

 throw out lateral shoots ; and these 

 should be trained to cover the bare 

 places. When the wall is rough, the 

 plant will adhere to it by means of 

 its own tendrils ; but it is generally 

 better either to nail it, or to tie it to 

 any projecting parts with strands of 

 bast mat. The roots may be either 

 in the open ground, in the free soil 

 of the conservatory, or in a pot ; but 

 in the latter case they should be 

 allowed abundance of room, and the 

 pot should be well drained. The 

 plant may also be treated either as 

 an annual, a biennial, or a peren- 

 nial, according to convenience. When 

 treated as an annual, the seeds 

 should be sown on a hotbed in 

 February ; and the plants should be 

 transplanted into pots, and after- 

 wards into the open ground, where 

 they are to flower, in April or May. 

 When the plant is grown as a bien- 

 nial, the seeds should be sown as 

 soon as they are ripe, in pots, and 

 the young plants should be kept 

 under shelter in a room or green- 

 house during winter, transplanting 

 ihem two or tlu'ee times till spring, 



when they should be removed to the 

 open ground, or to a larger pot, for 

 flowering. It may also be treated 

 as a perennial, when cuttings should 

 be struck in autumn under a bell- 

 glass, and the pots plunged into a 

 hotbed or tan-pit ; or, if the plants 

 be growing in the open air, layers 

 may be made by pegging down the 

 lower shoots of the growing plants 

 on the ground, and leaving them in 

 the open garden ; only taking care to 

 protect them, after they are sepa- 

 rated from the parent plant, by a 

 hand-glass during winter. Till 

 lately, C. scdndens was the only 

 species of the genus known ; but in 

 the autumn of 1839, and the spring 

 of 1840, some other species were 

 raised from Mexican seeds sent home 

 by Mr. Hartweg one of the botanical 

 collectors employed to collect new 

 plants by the London Horticultural 

 Society. The common Cobasa is also 

 a native of J\Iexico, where it is called 

 by a Spanish name, signifying the 

 Violet-bearing Ivy. 



CocciNE'LLA. — Under this name 

 naturalists distinguish the little 

 beetles generally called lady-birds, or 

 lady-cows. They creep slowly when 

 in their perfect state, and they are 

 generally found on the ground ; and 

 though they fly flist and well, they 

 are rarely seen on the wing. They 

 do no injury to plants, either in their 

 larva or their perfect state ; and when 

 the perfect beetle is found on a plant, 

 it is to find a place where it can lay 

 its eggs. Instinct teaches it to visit } 

 those plants most infested with 

 aphides, for it is on these noxious 

 j insects thatthe larva of the lady-bird 

 1 feeds ; and consequentlj', the eggs of 



that insect, which are of a bright 



I yellow, are always found on the leaves 

 1 of the shoots, the points of v.-hich are 

 I covered with the green-fly. The 

 larvfe are flattish, fleshy grubs, taper- 

 . ing to the tail ; they have six legs, 



