CHOROZEMAS. 55 
bed was certainly below par. Let not your readers shake their heads 
‘at this plan: a very wise head, viz., Mr. Lightbody’s, was shaken at 
it when I first communicated to him my intention of trying it. I shall, 
this year, adopt it with one-half my valuable seedlings, that come what 
‘weather it may I may be sure of a vigorous bloom. I am fully aware 
of the danger of overstimulating the Ranunculus, by which a strong 
bloom may often be got for one or two years, but which induces a 
dwindling and falling off of the roots for the future; but if the roots, 
for three years, bloom well and take up well, I shall not hesitate to 
‘recommend this as the best of all plans yet devised. All the nutritious 
and stimulating ingredients contained in the fresh manure being so 
diluted and intimately and equally dispersed through the soil, offer 
appropriate, easily digestible, and absorbable ingredients of nourish- 
ment ; and, of course, this is altogether different to the mixing or 
digging fresh manure en masse inthe soil. The roots of the Ranunculus 
will not penetrate a piece or mass of fresh manure, but perish, if kept 
in contact with it; and hence the necessity of using very old manure, 
when the bed is made in the ordinary way. Mr. Lightbody’s plan, and 
he is a great authority, is to put a stratum of three or four inches of 
old manure eight inches below the surface, the soil above and below 
being only very moderately enriched. He also recommends that the 
roots should be immediately planted in soil made light and free with 
‘sand—they take up so much larger. Indeed, the roots of the Ranun- 
culus penetrating so deep as fifteen or twenty inches, it is to the middle 
and lower depths that we must most carefully attend: here the soil 
must be retentive and without sand. 
I should state, that the soil in this neighbourhood is stiff and clayey ; 
and hence the necessity of using so much sand in the surface of the 
bed. Where the soil is naturally light, and not disposed to crack, my 
precautions will be the less called for—Dr. Horner, in the Gardeners’ 
Chronicle, 
CHOROZEMAS. 
Tus showy tribe of greenhouse plants well merits a place in every 
greenhouse. ‘The following method of treatment with C. angustifolium 
by Mr. Leach has succeeded most admirably in the gardens of S. Rucker, 
Esq., of Wandsworth (as given in the Gardeners’ Chronicle). It is 
equally applicable to all the tribe. 
Early in March or April he re-pots a small plant, six inches high, 
into a nine-inch pot, using Wimbledon peat, rotten turf, and vegetable 
mould, in equal parts, to which is added a good sprinkling of silver 
sand; this is passed through an inch and a half meshed sieve. An 
inch of crocks or bits of charcoal is given for drainage, over which is 
put two inches of the roughest of the soil; then fills round the ball of 
the plant with the compost. The surface of the ball inclines from the 
trunk of the plant to the side of the pot, to prevent water lodging 
round the trunk; which, if not guarded against, often kills the plants. 
The surface is an inch lower than the rim, to allow sufficient water to 
be retained at the time of watering, After potting, the plant is placed 
