136 GARDENING FOR BEGINNERS 



propagation be delayed until after the flowering period, the 

 season is too far advanced, and the weather generally too hot 

 for the divisions or offsets to make any progress, and they 

 either remain stunted during the summer, or, what is worse, 

 many may fail to grow at all. Some growers simply pull the 

 old plants to pieces in spring, and dibble out the divisions. 

 Many of these have hard woody stems and few fibres, and 

 unless the weather is mild and showery such divisions fail to 

 start. How much better then must it be to have a reserve of 

 young, clean, and well-rooted autumn-struck plants. If it is 

 necessary to transplant these in spring there will be no risk, as 

 each plant can be lifted with a good ball of earth, and they 

 begin to grow at once in their new quarters. Such young 

 stock would probably show flower buds, but these should 

 be pinched out, as the established beds would furnish the 

 supply. If, after planting, a slight mulch of decayed manure 

 could be spread around the plants so much the better, as 

 subsequent rains would carry the manurial properties down 

 to the roots, and the residue on the surface would greatly 

 assist to keep the ground cool and moist during a hot and dry 

 summer. During the summer encourage leaf growth free 

 from red spider. Keep the runners picked off and the ground 

 between the plants free from weeds. Treated in this way 

 the plants will not fail to give a wealth of bloom in due 

 season. 



Violets in Frames for Winter. However good the summer 

 treatment may have been, or how strong the plants may be 

 by autumn, a continuous supply of bloom throughout the 

 winter cannot be maintained without some protection. Tem- 

 porary frames may be placed over the beds, but then the 

 shady position the plants occupied during the summer would 

 be against free-flowering throughout a season of dull short 

 days. Therefore, the plants should be removed to a more 

 sunny one and planted in shallow frames an ordinary port- 

 able frame, such as is generally used for growing cucumbers 

 in during the summer ; indeed, a bed that has been used for 

 this purpose requires little alteration to receive the Violet 

 plants. The hillocks need only be levelled down, and the soil 

 trodden somewhat firmly and the Violet plants put out say 

 one foot apart. Of course, we are supposing that the soil in 

 the frame will not be more than eighteen inches from the 

 glass. The nearer the plants can be brought up to the glass 

 the better, so that every ray of sunshine reaches them. The 

 frame, too, should have a sharp pitch and face south. This 

 will allow of rain or snow passing off quickly, and then there 



