THE CAMELLIA. 389 



In a few months, when the growth stops and hardens, 

 they may be placed among other Camellias in pots, and 

 share in common with them the treatment which will be 

 advocated in our next paper. The blooming of seedlings 

 is often long deferred ; we have seen plants many years 

 old that had not given a single bloom. If the cultivator 

 wish for a speedy settlement of the value of his seedlings, 

 it is well to graft them on matured stocks as soon as he 

 can cut wood sufficiently strong for the purpose ; but this 

 process is expensive and unsatisfactory if applied exten- 

 sively, as he will probably by this practice propagate many 

 indifferent varieties. 



The Camellia is also grown from cuttings. All kinds 

 do not succeed equally well in this way, and there is no 

 means of deciding this question except by actual experi- 

 ment. Consequently, the named varieties are usually 

 grafted on the species (C. japonica), or single red, which 

 is found to grow freely from cuttings. 



Take pieces of the almost ripened wood in August or 

 September. Cut them into lengths of about 3 inches, 

 leaving two leaves to each cutting, and insert the cuttings 

 round the side of a 6-inch pot in a soil composed of sand 

 and peat. Plunge the pots in a cold pit, give one good 

 soaking in water, shade from the sun, and as winter 

 approaches protect them from frost. By the end of 

 February they should be removed to a close house and 

 placed on bottom-heat, where they will form roots in a 

 couple of months, when each rooted cutting may be trans- 

 ferred into a separate pot. These young plants should be 

 kept in a close house, syringed pretty freely, and shaded 

 until the new growth is finished and hardened, when they 

 also may be sent to join the general stock and subjected 

 to the general treatment. 



Grafting is another means of propagating the Camellia, 

 and the means most generally resorted to. Take a two- 

 year-old plant of the species or single red which has been 

 obtained from seed or from cuttings, as above described. 



