6 DIELTTEA SPECTABILIS. 



When employed for bedding out, for which, from its free-flowering habit, it is well 

 adapted, plants of the previous year's growth should be selected; though, when the 

 cuttings are, as we have advised, struck early, they will often make plants fit for turning 

 out the same summer, but are never so effective as the larger specimens. 



Like all other Geraniums, it must be removed from the open garden at the arrival 

 of the dull autumnal months, and repotted; and carefully preserved from frost and 

 over-watering during the winter season. 



DI ELYTRA SPECTABILIS, 



Moutan Diehjtra. 

 Class — Diadelphia. Order — Hexaxdrta. Natural Order — Fumariacejs. 



Few of our readers who are acquainted with this plant will, we imagine, be disposed 

 to differ from us, if we venture to pronounce it not only the handsomest of its order — 

 the Funieworts — but even of all spring-floweiing herbaceous plants. One species, D.formosa, 

 is an old inhabitant of our gardens ; but although a pretty, graceful plant, it is altogether 

 eclipsed by the elegant species now figured. Adapted equally for cultivation in the open 

 border, for the window, or for forcing in early spring, it possesses a threefold claim upon 

 the lover of flowers ; and there can be no doubt that it will soon gain as high a place in 

 the estimation of English gardeners, as it has long enjoyed among the Mandarins of its 

 native provinces. In suitable soil, the plant attains the height of eighteen inches, the 

 stems bearing both leaves and flowers ; and by this circumstance, as well as by its larger 

 size, it is distinguished from all the other species at present known, which have radical 

 leaves only. 



The handsome spreading foliage is biternate, with the leaflets toothed, or cut into 

 ovate segments. The flowers, each nearly one and a half inch long, and one inch in 

 breadth, are borne in racemes, which are both terminal and axillary; for convenience 

 sake only a few are shown in the figure, but the terminal racemes of an established plant 

 will frequently consist of ten or fifteen blossoms ; the axillary flowers are less numerous. 

 The sepals, two in number, as in all the plants of the order, falling off at a very early 

 stage of their growth, will be found only on the immature buds at the extremity of the 

 raceme. 



AYhether seen before expansion, when the swollen flowers present a singularly heart- 

 shaped form, or after the tips of the two outer petals have become reflexed, we know of 

 but few plants so strikingly elegant, and withal so unusual in their appearance. 



Cultivation. — "When grown in the open border, it will be advisable to plant it in 



