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scale, I should say, give to substance four points or 

 perhaps even five, and let us have some good, heavy, 

 velvety Pansies. Referring to ray diary I find March 

 10th has been the average date for planting pansy seed, 

 and May 20th for setting the plants in the open ground. 

 The young plants are treated in the same manner as the 

 asters, and are transplanted into beds as soon as the 

 ground becomes dry and warm. The beds are prepared 

 for the reception of these plants as previously described ; 

 except that thoroughly rotted cow manure, is the only 

 manure used ; horse manure should be avoided. Set the 

 plants two feet apart each way, and water thoroughly 

 in dry weather. Almost as soon as the plants have 

 become established in their new position, they will begin 

 to bloom ; and, unless they are closely watched and all 

 the buds are pinched off as they form, the plants will 

 exhaust themselves in producing a few very inferior 

 flowers, and grow very spindlingly. From the day that 

 the plants are transplanted into the open ground the beds 

 should be examined every morning ; every visible bud 

 should be pinched off, and every long shoot shortened ; 

 the object in view being to obtain large stocky plants full 

 of vitality. If this matter is attended to regularly it will 

 only take a few minutes each day ; but if neglected even 

 for a day, and the day be a warm one, some of the plants 

 will be sure to flower, which will weaken them and partly 

 undo our previous work. If the plants are thus kept 

 from flowering until cool weather and then allowed to 

 bloom, the flowers will be of good substance and large 

 size. I do not wish this to be taken as implying that I 

 ever consider the size of the flowers in any different light 

 than as mentioned in my scale of points ; but this keep- 

 ing back process will make large and at the same time 

 heavy and velvety flowers. After the first of September 

 the flowers of almost all other annuals begin to grow 

 poor, and the first frost practically ends their flowering. 

 But the Pansy seems rather to improve than otherwise by 



