ON THE CULTURE OF ERICAS. 225 



with the other. Both before and after the operation, the flower 

 impregnated is covered with a piece of thin gauze, to prevent the 

 bees or other insects from intermeddling and rendering the 

 operation vain. The colours of the parents are selected as distinct 

 and opposite as possible as to colour. The plants after operation 

 are placed in a situation in the greenhouse where they can receive 

 the full influence of the sun. The seeds are gathered as soon as 

 they begin to turn brown, otherwise, being furnished with a downy 

 appendage, they are liable to be blown away by the wind; they are 

 sown in pans or boxes, in light soil, and covered about a quarter 

 of an inch with the same, but finely sifted, and placed in a hot 

 bed frame. When they have made two or three pair of leaves, 

 they are potted into small pots, kept in a greenhouse. Though 

 few of the strongest plants flower the first summer, yet the greater 

 part do not till the following spring. 



AETICLE IV. 



ON THE CULTIVATION OF ERICAS. 



(Continued from page s;05.) 



There is no subject in gardening more difficult to give written 

 directions upon, than that of soils, so little, unfortunately, have 

 they been chemically studied, so vague and unintelligible are the 

 tests by which they are practically known. The soil which the 

 Ericeae and many other fine rooted plants prefer, is called peat, bog 

 mould, heath mould, moor earth, &c, and abounds in sufficient 

 quantities in many places, particularly in uncultivated heaths. But 

 of this soil there are both good and bad sorts, that is, sorts in 

 which plants will grow to perfection, and others in which they 

 languish and decay. Nor is it to be taken for granted that that 

 peat which produces the finest and healthiest crops of our common 

 heaths, such as Erica Tetralix, and cinerea, is always a fitting soil 

 to be used for exotic plants of similar habits ; for many, by con- 

 tenting themselves with this test, have found out their error, when 

 too late to remedy it. That peat is best which contains about one 

 fourth or one fifth of coarse white sand, and is taken from a dry 

 heathy common, which is never overflowed with water, and oft' a 

 sub-soil in which the recently discovered chemical substance, 

 creasote, which has deleterious effects upon all vegetables, docs 

 not abound. It might be well for the cultivator to have a chemi- 



Vol. VII. No. 80. DD 



