40 THE GREEN-HOUSE AND CONSERVATORY. 



and grow their plants with plenty of room, light, and air, 

 the evil will be remedied. 



They profess to grow plants for their beauty, not from 

 any profit to be derived from them ; and yet with this their 

 avowed object, their green-houses seldom present a more 

 respectable appearance than thjse of gardeners who profess 

 nothing. 



But it may be said, amateurs need the flowers for their 

 own use, and therefore must grow plants to produce the 

 most bloom. If this is so, let them grow their flowers for 

 cutting in some green-house used for nothing else, and use 

 their conservatories and fine plant-houses for specimen 

 plants. 



But there is a fundamental error underlying all this 

 theory ; a poorly grown plant does not produce more flowers 

 than one grown with care as a specimen ; the former may 

 be sooner drawn into bloom, but the latter affords the 

 greatest profusion. 



A constant cutting of the flowers will ruin a specimen 

 plant, unless great care is taken ; and this, together with 

 the time taken to perfect the specimen, is another reason 



why gardeners will not grow specimens. 





 But the plant is the object of attraction as much as the 





