v.] A POT OF MIGNONETTE- DETAILS 29 



to be brought back to the original spent hot bed, and so 

 by degrees rendered hardy enough for the cold frame 

 in which they shall be prepared for their ultimate 

 destination of greenhouse or border. 



It is more than likely that some of my readers may 

 before now have looked with curious eyes on a group 

 of very moderate-sized pots of Mignonette in the window 

 or on the counter of a London flower-shop, or in Covent 

 Garden Market itself, and may have wondered how the 

 nursery-gardeners contrive to produce such well-grown 

 plants, dwarf, healthy, floriferous, and without a leaf 

 turned. 



Every step in the production of a pot of Mignonette 

 is simple enough. What is chiefly needed is careful 

 attention to details as to soil, temperature, repotting, 

 a vigorous, steady advance from stage to stage in 

 growth, and, more important than all, the avoiding of 

 checks and sudden changes ; it is, as I have already said, 

 on such things ultimate success depends. This most 

 common and well-known and readily-grown of all garden 

 flowers may thus be taken as an illustration of how any 

 soft-wooded plant may be managed from start to finish. 

 Any one who will take sufficient pains, and who has 

 acquired the requisite knowledge to grow such a perfect 

 plant of Mignonette as I have described, may grow 

 almost any ordinary greenhouse flower the Chinese 

 Primula, Tuberous-rooted Begonia, Gloxinia, the Cineraria, 

 Calceolaria, and the Cyclamen. Something depends upon 

 the quality of the compost that is used ; one half should 



