A DIALOGUE ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE AURICULA. 149 



Auriculas, particularly the mealy-leaved ones, required no more than 

 usually allowed in October; however, that spring was an exception. 

 There was not that year an Auricula in bloom, in this part of the 

 country, before the 25th of April. My directions regard the usual 

 seasons. The Auricula ought by this time to be fully expanded : in 

 hot days they will require shading from the sun, from ten to four 

 o'clock in the evening, which I do by throwing a green baize over 

 the glass, at the same time giving them all the air, with discretion, 

 you possibly can, by opening each ventilator when the wind is not 

 too rough, to prevent the stems being drawn too fine. I still con- 

 tinue to cover them up at night. By no means leave the lights off 

 in the day longer than you remain in the garden, for the slightest 

 shower would at this time quite spoil their bloom by mixing their 

 colours, and reduce to a nullity all your prseter trouble. In this 

 month the first exhibition for the Auricula and Polyanthus is usually 

 held. Persons who are in a floricultural society generally, after the 

 first show day is over, remove their plants to summer quarters. 

 Should the weather prove very warm in May, the sooner the plants 

 are placed where they will receive the morning sun only the better. 

 Those plants I reserve for seed I put where they will have the full 

 day's sun, ^minding to supply them well with water, and in hot 

 weather I keep soakers under them ; yet I do not expose them to a 

 long continuance of heavy rain, since it often causes the capsule to 

 burst before the seed is matured. 



L. When do you consider the best time to sow the seed ? 



Inf. As soon as it is ripe. 



L. I have heard that February is the best month. 



Inf. If the seed is sown in the spring, it will be two years from 

 the time of sowing before the young plants will bloom ; whereas if the 

 Beed be sown in August, in all probability, with proper treatment, the 

 l>lants will bloom the next spring twelvemonth. I have, however, 

 three plants now in bloom, which were sown only in February, 1840, 

 being only fourteen months to the present time. They were trans- 

 planted the end of September, the rest were left in the seed-bed to 

 bloom where they were sown : there are about three hundred in all. 

 I sometimes sow them in large pots, taking care to put plenty of 

 draining under them. 



L. What do you use for draining? 



Ink. Broken pieces of pots or bricks, small stones, or the bone 



