230 General Notices. 



In order to understand this part of the question, it must be borne in 

 mind — 1, that liquid manure is an agent ready for immediate lise, its main 

 vahie depending upon that quality ; 2, that its effect is to prodvce exuberant 

 growth ; and 3, that it will continue to do so as long as the temperature and 

 light required for its action are sufficient. These three propositions, rightly 

 understood, point to the true principles of applying it ; and, if they are kept 

 in view, no mistakes can well be made. They render it evident that the 

 period in the growth of a plant, at which it should be applied, depends 

 entirely upon the nature of the plant, and the object to be gained. 



If, for example, wood and leaves are all that the cultivator desires to 

 obtain, it will be evident that liquid manure may be used freely from the 

 time when buds first break, until it is necessary that the process of ripening 

 the wood shall begin. Wood cannot ripen so long as it is growing ; wood 

 will continue to grow as long as leaves form, and its rate of growth will be 

 in direct proportion to their rate of development ; therefore, in order to 

 ripen wood, growth must be arrested. But the growth of wood will not be 

 arrested so long as liquid manure continues to be applied, except in the 

 presence of a temperature low enough to injure or destroy it. Hence it is 

 obvious that liquid manure must be withheld from plants grown for their 

 wood and leaves, at the latest, by the time when two thirds of the season 

 shall have elapsed. To administer it in such cases towards the end of the 

 year would be to produce upon it an effect similar to that caused by a warm 

 wet autumn, when even hardy trees are damaged by the earliest frost. 



In-the case of flowers it is to be remembered that the more leaves a 

 plant forms the fewer the blossoms in that season ; although perhaps the 

 more in a succeeding season, provided exuberance is then arrested. The 

 application of liquid manure is therefore unfavorable to the immediate pro- 

 duction of flowers. It is further to be remarked that even although flowers 

 shall have arrived at a rudimentary state at a time when this fluid is applied, 

 and that therefore their number cannot be diminished, yet that the effect of 

 exuberance is notoriously to cause deformity ; petals become distorted, the 

 colored parts become green, and leaves take the place of the floral organs, 

 as we so often see with roses grown with strong rank manure. In improv- 

 ing the quality of flowers, liquid manure is therefore a dangerous ingre- 

 dient; nevertheless, its action is most important, if it is rightly given. 

 The true period of applying it, with a view to heighten the beauty of 

 flowers, is undoubtedly when their buds are large enough to show that the 

 elementary organization is completed, and therefore beyond the reach of 

 derangement. If the floral apparatus has once taken upon itself the 

 natural condition, no exuberance will afterwards affect it ; the parts which 

 are small will sunply grow larger and acquire brighter colors ; for those 

 changes in flowers which cause monstrous development, appear to take 

 effect only when the organs are in a nascent state — at the very moment of 

 their birth. Hence it is clear, that in order to affect flowers advantageously 

 by liquid manure, it should be given to plants at the time when the flower 

 bud is formed and just about to swell more rapidly. 



With FEuiT it is different ; the period of application should there be 



