42 Notes and Gleanings. 



before they have to endure so much hot, dry weather. These remarks are in- 

 tended for those who have not planted ;.but autumn-planting is frequently prac- 

 tised in the south, and is best, simply securing the plants from injury from wind 

 by pegging them down, and surfacing the bed with a mixture from underneath 

 the potting-bench, run through a coarse sieve, or just making up a mixture of 

 common soil and leaf-soil for the occasion. In the south, it is most easy to win- 

 ter them out of doors in this way, if slugs are looked after ; but the real work 

 of preserving them comes on with the hot June and July weather, when, as 

 pansy-growers know to their sorrow, they seem to melt under old Sol's influence, 

 and plants which were in full health in the morning are prostrated before night. 

 I find the best safeguard against such mishaps is to frequently give the plants a 

 rose-pot watering in the evening, and then stir the surface early in the morning, 

 and give a slight top-dressing of the soil I have before alluded to. This keeps 

 the roots moist and cool ; and, by keeping the shoots well pegged down, this 

 occasional surfacing induces the side-shoots and young centre-shoots to root 

 freely, not only prolonging the bloom, but, in the autumn, yielding a large supply 

 of healthy young plants, without the trouble of putting in cuttings. Just take 

 up the plants, pull them to pieces, and plant the young rooted short pieces. If 

 the weather is very scorching, a few branches of evergreens stuck into the soil 

 amongst the plants will help to keep them cool. In the north, here, we have 

 great advantages in the cooler weather of summer; but we have terrible disad- 

 vantages in some districts in the severe winds we get, especially the cold east and 

 west winds of February and March. I dare not trust my plants, of which I annu- 

 ally grow thousands, out of doors, but take them all up in October or November. 

 After treating them in the manner I have recommended, — viz., by top-dressings, 

 and pegging out, — we take all up, pull them to pieces, throw away all old growth, 

 and plant in cold frames all the young rooted pieces. These frames are filled 

 with brick or other rubbish to within fifteen inches of the glass, and with about 

 six inches of good soil : the plants are near to the glass, and are kept as dry as 

 possible in wet weather, and as hardy as free ventilation can make them. 



" Pansies will stand any amount of frost if dry, but not frost with damp so 

 well. In fact, more, far more, pansies are lost from damp and neglect than by 

 frost. With such frame-treatment here, they do well, making stocky plants for 

 spring-planting. We keep them well aired and very hardy, never covering the 

 glass with mats or other covering, no matter how severe the weather, but, as I 

 said before, keeping them as dry as possible, and looking well after the removal 

 of damping foliage. Cuttings can be put in at various times through the summer, 

 under hand-glasses, or in cold frames under a north wall ; keeping them close for 

 a fortnight or so, but looking after damp. 



" It will be as well to state, that, in very hot, dry weather, the pansy suffers 

 sometimes from attacks of the black aphis. The moment this appears, they 

 should be washed with tobacco-water ; and the plants must be kept freely syr- 

 inged and growing freely. 



'•What are termed 'bedding-pansies ' are an entirely distinct type ; snd of 

 these I entertain a very high opinion as bedding-plants. Some of the bedding- 

 pansies now in use are simply selected free-blooming forms of the ordinary 



