THE MANSE GARDEN. 221 



and then kept on or off according to the weather, 

 using the help of a bass matting in every hard frost. 

 Before winter, fill up the vacant inch left on the 

 surface of the pots with old dung gathered from the 

 fields, which replace with fine mould about the time 

 of flowering. To destroy green-fly, with which the 

 plants are apt to be infested, a slight cloud of tobacco 

 fumes, closed for a few minutes under the glass cover, 

 is all that is necessary. 



Should any reader be surprised at the trouble, 

 whether of writing or of observing the above direc- 

 tions, it may certainly be inferred, that he has never 

 once seen a choice and well managed collection of 

 auriculas. Other flowers in congregated array may 

 be more dazzling, but the auricula so exhibited has 

 no rival in soft^rich, and diversified beauty. It has 

 more of dignity than gayety; it has not the tinsel 

 of a theatre, but the jewellery and grandeur of an 

 assembly of nobles and high dames, in broad ruftj 

 powder, crimson, purple, and ermine. The sight 

 justifies the art. Art cannot make the purple of the 

 auricula ; but without art the auricula has not the 

 purple ; and the finest forms, left to the common fare 

 of earth and skies, soon become the spectres of what 

 they were the gorgeous velvet dwindling to the 

 meanness of hawkweed, and the crownbroad disk to 

 th,e, dimensions of a daisy. 



Carnations Of which the technical names are, 1. 

 Flakes, having one colour on a white ground, and 

 which appears on both sides of the petal; 2. Bizarres, 

 having two colours on a white ground ; 3. Piquettees, 

 ground white or yellow spotted with other colours, 

 and the edges of the petals fringelike or serrated; 



