194 ON GROWING PLANTS IN ROOMS. 



ARTICLE II. 



ON GROWING PLANTS IN ROOMS. 



BY A LONDON AMATEUR GROWER. 



Being an admirer of the prevailing practice of cultivating plants in 

 rooms, and having had numerous solicitations for advice as to their 

 management, I am induced to draw up the accompanying remarks, 

 judging that they may he in some degree useful to a portion at least 

 of the readers of the Floricultural Cabinet. I do not wish it to 

 he understood that I think plants can be grown as vigorous, or 

 blossom as freely, in rooms as those cultivated in well -constructed 

 greenhouses ; but I do not hesitate to assert that those persons who 

 may think proper to adopt the rules hereafter laid down will find the 

 result to answer every expectation. 



Pots. — The necessity of having pots of various sizes is very ob- 

 vious ; the shape, however, should be uniform, in proportion as 

 follows, viz. : five inches deep (inside measure), five inches diameter 

 at the top, and three and a-half inches diameter at the bottom. Pans 

 should be provided to correspond. 



Draining. — Good draining is essentially requisite. Each pot, 

 according to their different sizes, should have from two to four inches 

 deep of coal cinders, broken to the size of a child's common play 

 marble, laid at the bottom, first placing a piece of pot over the hole 

 at the bottom, taking care the piece is not flat, but of that form that 

 it will freely allow superabundant water to pass off. 



Soil. — Take the top spit with the turf upon it from a common or 

 old pasture field, not digging deeper than six inches; the soil should 

 be entirely free from clay and if the loam be sandy it is preferable. 

 To this soil add one-fourth of rotten horse-dung. The longer this 

 compost is laid together the better. Before using it for planting in, 

 it must be well chopped and broken, but not sifted at all through a 

 riddle, as plants flourish far more freely in the soil when left open, 

 there being a freer passage for water, heat, air, &c, to the roots. 

 There are but five families of greenhouse plants that refuse to flourish 

 in such a compost as the above. I do not include Camellias and 

 Ericas (Heaths), though I have no doubt but they may be cultivated 

 in rooms with success ; the latter tribe will be found the most tena- 

 cious of injury in such an habitation. 



