BOOK II. DRY-STOVE PLANTS. 919 



6659. Propagation and culture. After the ample directions on the subject of propagating and cultivat- 

 ing bulbs, already given (6501.), very little can require to be added here. A mode of propagating such ;u 

 rarely produce offsets may be mentioned : it applies only to tunicate bulbs, which, if cut over transversely, 

 a little above the middle, will form young bulbs in abundance near the margin of the outer coat. This has 

 been successfullypractised with hremanthus pubescens, and several of the more rare ornithogalin?. The 

 grand art in cultivating bulbs is, to attend to the proper time for putting them into a state of rest ; and 

 when they are in a growing state, to place them so near the light, and afford such a supply of air and water 

 as will enable them to bring their leaves to perfection. The management of exotic bulbs is, in general, 

 very imperfect among gardeners, who cannot be too much impressed with the importance of attending to 

 these two points, the perfecting the leaves, and the putting the bulbs into, and keeping them during a 

 proper time, in a state of rest. Bulbous-rooted plants associate almost as ill with all others as succulents 

 do ; and, therefore, wherever a good collection is kept, there should be a house entirely devoted to their 

 culture. The roof should be low and not very steep, and the pots should be kept on a level stage or plat- 

 form, raised table high, or about two feet and a half, that the flowers may be near the eye. A house, 

 glass on all sides, with a central platform, six or eight feet wide, and two side ones, or side borders, about 

 three feet wide, would form an excellent house for plants of this description, as all of them would be near 

 the glass, and near the eye of the spectator. "Whenever the bulbs, cultivated in such a house, became in 

 a dormant state, they could be removed to a pit or frame of proper temperature in the reserve-garden, and 

 kept there dry, till the growing season. Exotic bulbs require nearly the same degree of heat, when 

 lying dormant, as they do when growing. 



SECT. VI. Herbaceous and stendess Green-house Plants. 

 6660. HERBACEOUS AND STEMLESS GREEN-HOUSE PLANTS. 



6661. Propagation and culture. A small house, constructed like a bulb-house, should be devoted to 

 these plants ; some of which are of considerable beauty : but they do not assort well with woody and ever- 

 green species. All the difference between the culture of hardy, and exotic herbaceous plants, consists 

 in the latter being kept in a different climate and in pots. 



SECT. VII. Of Selections of Green-house Plants for particular Purjwses. 

 6662. The particular purjwses to which green-house plants are applicable are few com- 

 pared with those for which plants which grow in the open air may be selected. The 

 most hardy species will he found arranged as frame plants ; the most showy and odori- 

 ferous under the first four sections. There are scarcely any green-house aquatics ; but a 

 few marsh plants ; and no parasites, or air plants, suitable for the green-house, have been 

 introduced hitherto. Collections, however, might be made of such as are grown in their 

 native countries for useful or economical purposes, and whose produce is imported to 

 this country, as of Laurus camphom, the camphor-tree ; Pistada lentiscus, the tree which 

 affords mastich ; of such as are highly odoriferous, as Verbena, Heliotrojnum, &c. In a 

 botanical collection, Dioncca and Sarracenia are plants of great rarity, and difficult to pre- 

 serve or propagate. They are generally procured from their native countries, and grown 

 in peat-earth, kept moist, and the atmosphere also rendered humid by covering them 

 with a hand-glass. Cresswell has produced very strong plants of S.purpurea, by treat- 

 ing it as a stove plant. Under his management, " it is planted in a mixture of the 

 fibrous roots, obtained from peat-earth, with an equal quantity of rotten willow wood, 

 broken into small pieces, by which the soil is kept perfectly drained. The pots in which 

 the plants grow are kept in a shaded part of the stove, afhd watered occasionally, but they 

 do not require to be placed in pans of water, except they become so dry as not to absorb 

 the water given in the usual way." (Hort. Trans, iii. 360.) Some fine specimens of 

 these genera, and also of Nepenthes distillatoria, are contained in the collection of Messrs. 

 Loddiges, at Hackney. 



CHAP. XIII. 

 Dry-stove Plants. 



6663. What are called dry-stove plants are such as from experience have been found 

 to require an intermediate degree of heat between the green-house and bark-stove plants 

 and a more dry atmosphere than the latter. Their propagation and culture is the same 

 as for green-house plants ; with this difference, that they are not in general removed to 

 the open air during summer ; but where the construction of the house admits, the sashes 

 may be removed in dry weather during the three warmest months, but always replaced 

 on the commencement of heavy or cold rains and boisterous winds. We shall arrange 

 them as woody, climbers, succulent, bulbous, and herbaceous plants. To cultivate them 

 to any degree of perfection, it is essentially necessary that a house be appropriated to each 

 section ; and each house so arranged as that the plants may be near the glass, and that 

 heat and air may be supplied at the pleasure of the cultivator, or a long narrow house 

 may be divided so as to keep each class separate. 



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