88 REMARKS ON THE HYDRANGEA HORTENSIS. 



leaves to keep them to the soil; this is the safest method. They 

 ■will soon root, if a good heat is maintained, and may he repotted 

 immediately. When the roots are established, some persons recom- 

 mend giving them rest by placing them in a strictly dormant state. 

 To this I object, as I often find them difficult to excite, and never 

 making such good plants as when the following practice is pursued. 



In February, shake the earth from the roots and trim the leaves ; 

 plant them in 24-sized pots in a good sandy loam and peat, plung- 

 ing them in a strong heat, watering sparingly until the plants appear, 

 when they may be watered freely. When the roots appear through 

 the bottoms of the pots, remove into No. 12 pots, in which they are 

 to bloom ; plunge in a bark bed, surrounding the plants and pots 

 with moss, on which the leaves will rest. They will now require a 

 very liberal supply of water over head. In April the flowers will 

 appear in great profusion. By following the above treatment, the 

 flowers will be much larger and more brilliant in colour, and the 

 leaves will grow from ten to fifteen inches long. In the autumn, 

 when the plants show signs of decay, gradually diminish the quantity 

 of water, but not so as to let them become quite dormant ; the best 

 situation for them in this stage is a dry shelf in a cool stove or warm 

 greenhouse. 



ARTICLE VIII. 



REMARKS ON THE HYDRANGEA HORTENSIS. 



BY S. P., OF IPSWICH, IN SUFFOLK. 



In the last Number of your Cabinet, I read with much pleasure the 

 interesting article of Mr. Kursnerr of London, on producing blue 

 flowers on the Hydrangea Hortensis ; the subject is an exceedingly 

 interesting one, and if my memory serves me, similar inquiries were 

 made a few years since in the Floriculturai, Cabinet by some of 

 your readers. I have, upon the lawn in the front of my cottage, an 

 Hydrangea which last summer measured 32 feet round, and had upon 

 it upwards of 200 heads of flowers, many of them very large, and pro- 

 ducing a picture of floral splendour which was greatly admired. 

 About four years since I placed a small plant of the same kind in a 

 flower border a few yards distant, previously filling the hole with a 

 mixture of bog earth and stable manure ; the flowers in the following 



