BULBS - LAYERS - DIVISIONS 



89 



"Both classes of bulbs undergo practically the same treatment 

 in the 'nurse-room,' a place in the bulb store reserved for them 

 and kept at a high temperature. Here they remain for a fortnight 

 or so when about 

 one hundred bulbels 

 in the case of scooped 

 bulbs, and thirty in 

 that of the notched 

 ones will have formed 

 upon them. They are 

 left until all the other 

 bulbs are planted so 

 as to give them the 

 care of the nursery 

 as long as possible. 

 Then, usually in the 

 last week in October 

 or the first week in 

 November, they, too, 

 are taken to the fields 

 and planted. The 

 ground has been care- 

 fully prepared for 



their reception Well Fig. 34 A notched Hyacinth bulb. The bulbels are 

 rhio- nr> anrl liVkArallv few but larger than those obtained when bulbs are 

 dug Up ana liberally scooped (See page 87) 



dressed with well- 

 rotted cow-dung earlier in the year. This kind of fertilizer is pre- 

 ferred to others, including lime, etc., both because it is more econom- 

 ical and because it is less harmful to the Hyacinth, whose extremely 

 sensitive bulb would be burned up by lime or similar substances 

 Hyacinths cannot be set in the same ground except at two-year 

 intervals, or at one-year intervals if the soil has been turned up from 

 a much greater depth. Both Tulips and Hyacinths thrive on a 

 piece of ground that is used in alternate years for each of them, and 

 this is what is usually done. 



"Taken to the field, the bulbs are set in the ground at a depth of 

 about five inches, an area of about five square inches being allowed 

 for each. The flower beds, one of which stretches almost the entire 

 length of the field, are so disposed that each shall be three feet wide 

 and that a path one foor wide shall be left between them. When 

 all is ready the whole field is covered with about ten inches 

 of hay or straw, a necessary precaution, for the Hyacinth is very 

 susceptible to the cold. The fields lie thus till Spring, and then 



