284 JVotcs and Gleanings. 



with water, or it will become sour, and the seed will perish. Tilt the glass a 

 little when a fair proportion of the young plants are visible, and in about a week 

 afterwards remove it altogether. To prevent over-crowding, when the plants are 

 strong enough, prick them off into pans or pots filled with light compost, and from 

 thence pot them off separately, in three-inch pots, when about an inch in height. 

 Keep them in a shady position until they have recovered from the effects of the 

 shift, and then remove to an open posij'ion, and stand the pots upon a bed of 

 coal ashes. After the first week in October, considerable risk will be run if they 

 remain in the open air ; therefore, soon after the end of September, remove them 

 to a frame where they can have an abundance of air in mild weatlier, and pro- 

 tection from frost when required. The stock can be wintered in a green-house 

 very successfully, but the plants must have the advantage of a light and airy 

 position, and must not be crowded up with other plants. When they become 

 drawn during the winter, the lower leaves usually fall off in the spring, and the 

 plants present a somewhat unsightly appearance in consequence. One of the 

 most essential points is to guard against their becoming pot-bound, or their suf- 

 fering from drought ; but they must not be over-potted or over-watered. If the 

 pots into which they are put from the seed pans are moderately well filled with 

 roots prior to the end of October, shift them into pots one size larger ; otherwise 

 do not re-pot them until the middle of January, and then put them into six-inch 

 pots. As it will not be safe or convenient to plant them out before the end of 

 May, re-pot them in April, and put the largest-sized plants into ten-inch pots, 

 and the others into eight-inch. A few of the smallest may be put into pots six 

 inches in diameter, and they will be found useful for mixing with the flowering 

 plants in large rustic baskets, or for the centre of small terra cotta or stone vases. 



Floral World. 



Prices of Fruit. — The English Journal of Horticulture and its correspon- 

 dents are discussing the Covent Garden market monopolists, and it would appear 

 that their practices are much worse than those mentioned in our Vol. VII., p. 296, 

 where Mr. Strong tells of the grape dealers who sold for twenty cents per pound 

 the grapes which they had bought for ten cents per pound, thus receiving for the 

 mere trouble of weighing them out exactly as much as the cultivator did for his 

 months of toil. We thought this bad enough, but one of the English fruit growers 

 received for a pound and three quarters of forced strawberries five shillings and 

 sixpence, from which one shilling was deducted for carriage and commission. 

 The retail price the same day was thirty-six shiHings per pound, and the net 

 price to the grower was about one fourteenth part of this ! One would think 

 that even a fruit dealer ought to be satisfied with a profit of thirteen hundred 

 per cent. Other correspondents mention similar cases, though none quite so 

 bad as this. No wonder such a monopoly is stigmatized as " hateful." 



Rhododendrons. — The extent to which these beautiful shrubs have been 

 planted in England may be judged from the statement of the Gardener's Maga- 

 zine, that the money spent on them in the last twenty years would nearly suffice 

 to pay oflF the national debt. 



