" LIFTED " CHRYSANTHEMUMS 59 



as possible and sometimes swamped, at others dust dry. They 

 are not to be treated as mere temporary tenants, but as nearly 

 as possible should have reproduced for them the ideal conditions 

 under which they had flourished out of doors. We have again 

 and again seen 'mums lifted from the open without any soil 

 attaching to the roots, crowded into the houses, and within a 

 fortnight the foliage has all been dead. Nothing was left to 

 feed the bloom, and when it opened it was of the poorest quality, 

 and the stalks were little better than dead sticks. What kind 

 of market could such flowers command ? 



FIG. 13. "Lifted" Chrysanthemum 

 Madame R. Oberthur, at Christmas 



The value of the bloom is doubled and trebled if the stalk 

 is long and furnished with good, healthy foliage, and this cannot 

 be if the plants are crowded or dry. Where light cannot pene- 

 trate there can be no green leaves, hence the need of allowing 

 a little space between the plants. Foliage is often killed through 

 the carelessness of the person watering them, for if water is 

 constantly poured in to the plant through the leaves, they will 

 turn black, just as the lower leaves of a pot chrysanthemum 

 turn black through the same cause. No, the watering pot 

 must be one with a long spout, which must be inserted beneath, 

 and not through, the foliage. 



