GREENHOUSE AND HOTHOUSE FLOWERS 151 



replaced by anything else. Some amateurs may consider that if 

 the soil in their garden is capable of growing good vegetables 

 and fruit it ought to be good enough for greenhouse flowers, and 

 consequently may feel free to draw upon it when potting. As to 

 this, two things may be said: first, garden mould rarely contains 

 enough fibre for sustaining pot plants, which, owing to their 

 circumscribed surroundings, need food in a concentrated state ; 

 secondly, the garden soil is needed where it is. Fibrous loam 

 can always be bought from a nurseryman, or dealer in garden 

 41 sundries," and the price may be about a shilling a bushel. 

 Where only a few plants are being grown this is well enough, 

 but where a large number are being dealt with it is more economical 

 to try and procure a load of turves from a builder, or from some 

 other person who is cutting up grass land. The turves should be 

 placed in a heap, reversed, so as to bring the grass side under- 

 neath, and left for nine or ten months, in order that the grass 

 may die. The heap may then be sliced down with a spade as the 

 soil is required for potting. The decayed fibres of turf are highly 

 nourishing to plants. 



With respect to leaf-mould, this merely consists of rotted leaves. 

 When the reader treads the soft vegetable mould of a forest he 

 compresses beneath his feet the leaves of former years, which have 

 fallen and decayed. If he collects fallen leaves in autumn, and 

 stores them for a few months in a well-trodden heap in a pit, or 

 some out-of-the-way corner of the garden, they will decay, and 

 give him a supply of leaf-mould. He can, of course, buy it from 

 nurserymen and dealers, in the same way as fibrous loam, if 

 necessary. 



As to the decayed manures, the ordinary " rotted dung " of the 

 kitchen gardener is not the kind of substance suitable ; what is 

 wanted is the dry, crumbly stuff that comes from a hotbed which 

 has done service for Cucumbers, or Violets, or some other crop, 

 and which is no more disagreeable to use than decayed leaf-mould. 



