260 BRECK'S BOOK OF FLOWERS. 



is laden with vapors, are most congenial to its growth. It is, 

 therefore, well calculated for the shrubbery. With a little 

 attention, it may be inured to stand the sun, and then forms a 

 stately ornament for the lawn or grass-plot. The proper soil 

 is a light, rich, peaty loam, with moisture. It will grow, how- 

 ever, in almost any, and flourish on a strong, heavy loam. 

 It may be propagated from cuttings and layers, from young, 

 healthy branches of ripened wood, and, managed as ordinary 

 plants, thus increased. There are many exotic species, which 

 are beautiful, and highly ornamental to the green-house. R. 

 ponticum and many others will withstand the winter in the 

 open ground, if well protected, as most of them are natives of 

 cold, mountainous regions, and covered in the winter by Alpine 

 snows. 



R. maximum is one of the parents from which a numerous 

 family of splendid varieties have been produced, all equally 

 hardy, and are only to be known, and their cultivation under- 

 stood, to make the'm more common. The Messrs. Hoveys 

 have exhibited, at the Horticultural Rooms, the flowers of many 

 splendid varieties, grown in their nurseries, at Cambridge, in 

 the open ground, fully exposed to the sun, in a rather low, 

 moist location, and a peaty soil. 



PROPAGATION OF RHODODENDRON BY LAYERS. 



" When the plants are in full growth, merely peg down the 

 young shoots, without any incision, and cover them with about 

 two inches of soil, and by the following spring they will be 

 ready to separate. 



" Cuttings of half-ripened wood, planted under a hand-glass, 

 in September, on a north border, in peat earth, will often strike 

 and make good .plants, but layers are preferable. 



" Separating the plant at. the roots. This is merely tearing 

 off, or separating with a sharp knife, those branches with roots 

 attached to them, which is the case when many branching 

 stems spring from the same root. 



" By seed. Sow the seed on a bed of peat soil, (heath 



