The Tuberous Begonia, 



ITS HISTORY AND CULTIVATION. 



TfJHE Tuberous-rooted Begonia so called after M. Begon, a French 

 slT botanist though for some years subsequent to its introduction into 

 ^ this country in its original form but little esteemed, except perhaps 

 to some extent as a cariosity, has of late years developed, under 

 cultivation, so many valuable qualities, has proved itself to be possessed 

 of so extraordinary a capability for improvement in almost every respect, and 

 consequently is annually gaining in popularity by such long and rapid strides, 

 that little doubt can be entertained that in the immediate future it will be 

 cultivated in numbers approaching, if not absolutely equalling, those to 

 which the Zonal Pelargonium has already attained. A duration of flowering 

 extending continuously over a period of five or six months, and a range of 

 colour embracing every imaginable shade of white, rose, pink, red, scarlet, 

 crimson, lake, orange, and yellow, combined with the richest and most delicate 

 tints, are no mean advantages to start with. , And when to these are added 

 a nearly perfect adaptability to almost any kind of culture whether planted 

 out-of-doors, or grown in pots, boxes or baskets, in the open air or under 

 glass, with artificial heat or without, the power of withstanding apparently 

 uninjured the extremes of wet and stormy weather, or of tropical heat and 

 drought, a hardiness enabling the roots to endure*, uninjured in the open 

 ground the severity of ordinary English winters, except perhaps in cold or wet 

 soils an unequalled capacity for being stored in large numbers without the 

 aid of glass, and in a very small space and, above all, the capability of being 

 improved in every point that constitutes a first-class decorative subject to 

 an extent up to the present time almost incredible, and still far from being 

 fathomed or determined, as well as an extraordinary profuseness and persist- 

 ence of bloom, the flowers in most cases being also remarkable for size and 

 showiness who can say what future may be in store for such a plant, or 

 what other denizen of our gardens and greenhouses can lay or substantiate a 

 claim to so many advantages ? 



With the single exception of the Zonal Pelargonium there is no other 



