266 THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



pots, and I would recommend those to whom the expense of the 

 bulbs is not a serious matter, to grow a few specimens in this way. 

 It will, perhaps, be better to make a beginning with specimens con- 

 sisting of six or eight bulbs, and to employ eight or nine-inch pots. 

 The principal points in the cultivation of specimens are to select 

 none but thoroughly reliable varieties, and to put one sort only in 

 each pot. The best kinds for this culture are Baron Van Tvyll, 

 dark blue ,; Charles Dickens, bluish lilac ; Grand Lilas, azure blue ; 

 Amy, dark red ; Belle QMrine, bright red ; Veronica, deep red ; 

 Alba Superhissima, Grandeur a Met'veille, and Madame Van der 

 Hoop, white, and white shaded. 



I hope it is not expected that I should say much about tbe culti- 

 vation of hyacinths, for it is so simple, and so many excellent 

 treatises have appeared in the Floral World upon the subject that 

 nothing further appears necessary. I will add that my bulbs are 

 potted in September in a mixture of two parts turfy loam and one 

 part well-rotted manure. Five and six-inch pots are employed, 

 according to the size of the individual bulbs. They have a good 

 layer of crocks placed in the bottom, the bulbs are buried to about 

 two-thirds of their depth, and the soil pressed firm ; the pots are 

 then placed on a hard bottom out of doors, and covered with a layer 

 of cocoa-nut fibre refuse, about a foot in thickness, which is sufficient 

 to keep out the frost. "When the pots are nicely filled with the 

 roots, and the growth an inch or so in height, they are taken from 

 the plunge-bed and placed iuja frame, and near the glass. They 

 are protected from frost, supplied with soft water as required, and 

 as they come into bloom are drafted to the conservatory. I do not 

 attempt to force hyacinths, and I should not advise amateurs to do 

 so, for with the foregoing selection they will have a long succession 

 of bloom from quite the early part of March. Provided the bulbs 

 are of good quality, and are purchased and potted early, a compost 

 such as I have recommended employed, due care taken to remove 

 them from the plunge-bed as soon as they are sufficiently advanced, 

 and when they are in the frame to keep them near the glass and 

 properly supplied with water, the spikes mil be large and of first 

 class quality, and the foliage be stout and of a fine deep colour. The 

 plants will, in fact, resemble the examples met with at the public 

 exhibitions which amateurs usually regard with some degree of 

 wonder. 



NOTES ON NEW BEDDERS. 



BY WILLIAM GAEDINEB. 



URING the last two years very few new bedding plants 

 have been introduced to public notice, and only a small 

 proportion of these possess any real value, and a very 

 few words indeed will suffice to pass the leading bedders 

 under review. 

 The leaf-plants, now so extensively employed for carpet bedding 



