COLUMBINE. 



118 



COMPOSTS. 



colours. They may be arranged with 

 jxcellent effect, thus : 



However, such repetitions are seldom 

 practicable or desirable in actual planting. 

 It would require a border ten yards wide 

 to hold such an arrangement ; and if ever 

 so successfully managed, too much of a 

 good thing would be the general verdict. 



Ribbon-borders, from six to twelve feet 

 wide, and planted with so many distinct 

 and separate colours, are generally the 

 most effective. For the greatest width 

 here stated, perhaps they are most beauti- 

 ful divided by a row of the tallest plants in 

 the middle, and both sides planted alike, 

 or different in colour, but similar in height, 

 gradually falling from the centre to the sides. 

 In a large ribbon rising from front to back, 

 eleven rows deep, bounded on one side by 

 a terrace- walk fourteen feet wide, and on 

 the other by a gravel walk five feet wide, 

 the following was the arrangement : 



ist Row. Lobelia speciosa. 



2nd Row. Cerastiurn tomentosum. 



3rd Row. " Happy Thought' 1 geranium. 



4th Row. Purple King verbena. 



5th Row. Calceolaria aurea floribunda. 



6th Row. Scarlet geranium. 



7th Row. Ageratum irexicanum (medium-sized 

 variety). 



8th Row. Cineraria maritima. 



9th Row. Perilla nankinensis. 

 loth Row. Dwarf yellow dahlia, 

 nth Row. Dwarf scarlet ditto. 

 i2th Row. White verbena. 



Columbine. See Aquilegia. 



Composts. 



The successful flower grower should 

 \ways have at hand 



1. All the leaves which can be got 



together, except those in the shrubberies, 

 which should be dug in. 



2. A heap of clean road-grit. 



3. A heap of sand, silver or river. 



4. A good stack of turfs cut from some 

 pasture, three inches or less in thickness. 



5. A heap of cow-dung. 



6. A heap of stable-dung, which is most 

 suitable for the preseut purpose when 

 taken from an old hotbel. 



7. A stack of turfy peat from a common. 



8. All the waste of the garden should 

 also be placed where it may rot, for it is a 

 capital dressing ; because, when once fairly 

 rotted into mould, it is next in value to 

 pure leaf-mould. 



We hear and read a great deal of all 

 manner of exciting composts, such as guano, 

 night-soil, bullock's blood, offal of the 

 slaughterhouse, sugar-bakers' scum, and 

 various other not very nice material ; but 

 all this resolves itself into the single fact 

 that all animal matter, as well as animal 

 dung, enriches the ground bone-dust, 

 shavings of horn and hoofs, among the 

 rest. There is an uncertainty about the 

 strength of all these materials which 

 renders them unsuited for delicate and 

 valuable plants, although, for farming oper- 

 ations and coarse-vegetable growing, they 

 are valuable. A collection of florists' 

 flowers cannot be played with, and their 

 existence would be often placed in jeopardy 

 by exciting composts, of which the strength 

 is not easily ascertained ; whereas all those 

 materials which we have recommended are 

 known. Beyond these we may mention 

 rabbit, sheep, and even poultry droppings, 

 which may be obtained for the purpose of 

 using as liquid manure after being 

 thoroughly decomposed ; such liquid 

 manure being made by stirring a pound 

 of rotted poultry dung, or half a peck of 

 rabbit-, sheep-, or cow-dung, in eighteen 

 gallons of water for two or three days, and, 

 when settled, it is fit for use. 



