558 General Notices. 



faction, in a pot 11 inches over, the same in depth, and forming a handsome 

 beehive cone, about a foot high above the pot, and projecting compactly 

 over the rim. It is covered with hundreds of its azure flowers. As the 

 flowerets are of short duration, two or three minutes are required daily to 

 pick off the old ones. The plant well deserves this attention. 



Many plants of recent introduction are recommended for bedding out, and 

 the P. LarpentBB among the rest ; this property of the plant I doubt, but 

 will say, a partial shade above, plenty of side light, and air, with heat, 

 rather above temperate, may form the habitat. When speaking of ■plants, 

 I will note another plant in flower with us at the present time. It is the 

 Buonapartia Juncea, {Littaageminijlorce) a flower well known in botanical 

 collections, by its stiff rushy habit, although more graceful than the com- 

 mon rush bush, by the handsome bend of its rushy leaves. This is the 

 first time that the Buonapartia has flowered with us ; the flowers are liliya- 

 ceous, and have not much beauty, being of a dingy white ; however, the 

 six stamens and anthers have some show. The flower stem is 12 feet 

 high, and 5 inches in girth. — {I^orth British Agriculturist, 1849, p. 362.) 



Of this plant too much was at first expected, and now having been ex- 

 tensively grown and flowered for one year, has been pronounced by most 

 cultivators as worthless. Being a native of Shanghae in China, where the 

 thermometer often falls much lower than in this country, it was supposed 

 to be hardy, and would prove a great acquisition as a blue bedding plant; 

 that such however will not be the case, seems now beyond all doubt. In 

 many parts of the country plants have been planted out in the best situa- 

 tions, and scarcely put forth a bloom ; even for the common greenhouse it 

 seems too tender, as may at once be readily seen from plants in such situa- 

 tions assuming a reddish stinted appearance ; an intermediate house seems 

 to suit it best. The following particulars of a plant grown here, may per- 

 haps be interesting to some of your readers, and may be the means of sav- 

 ing the species from a fate which, by almost universal consent, seems 

 awaiting it, viz., being hewn up as a cumberer of the ground, and cast into 

 the rubbish heap. In May last, my oldest plants, being nearly cut to pieces 

 for the purpose of propagation, I had a nicely rooted cutting selected and 

 carefully potted into a four-inch pot ; it was grown in stove heat till about 

 the end of June, and frequently shifted till the middle of July, when it 

 received its last shift into a shallow pot or pan 8 inches across, and 5 inches 

 deep. The house in which it has grown since June has been kept rather 

 close, but no fire heat used till the middle of September, when a gentle 

 fire was kindled once a day. It is now one foot high and six feet in cir- 

 cumference, with 147 heads of its beautiful light blue blossoms, each head 

 having from 2 to 5 fully expanded flowers, and is indeed a beautiful floral 

 object, being of the easiest cultivation. It has well repaid the little trouble 

 bestowed upon it, and having still hundreds of unexpanded blooms, the 

 plant is expected to flower till past Christmas ; if such be the case, it will 

 prove invaluable for cut flowers, at a time when such are much in re- 

 quest. — {Id.) 

 Bedding-out Plants. — I am glad to observe a discussion going on in the 



