JANUARY 171 



long evenings. A greenhouse evergreen called Rhodo- 

 dendron jasminiflorum is worth all trouble. It is in 

 bloom now, sweet and graceful and not at all common. 

 All these half-hardy hard-wooded plants I find rather 

 difficult to keep in health, but I am going to pay much 

 more attention to their summer treatment. They want 

 to go out for a month or two; but, to prevent their 

 getting dry, they must be either sunk in cocoanut fibre, or 

 surrounded by moss, or covered with straw. If sunk in 

 the earth, worms are apt to get in. I think they are best 

 replaced towards the middle of August into the cool 

 house, where they can be watched. Sinking the small 

 pot into a larger with some moss between is the best help of 

 all. There is no fun in growing only the things everyone 

 can grow, and nothing vexes me like seeing a plant which 

 came quite healthy from a nurseryman, and in a year 

 not only has not grown, but looks less well than when it 

 first came. 



The Choisya ternata cut back in May is flowering 

 splendidly. I wish I had room for eight pots of them 

 instead of only two. There are several pots with Epi- 

 phyllum truncatum in full flower. The flowers are very 

 pretty when seen close, and look well gathered and 

 put into small glasses ; but the colour is a little metallic 

 and magentary. Most greenhouses have them, but few 

 people manage to flower them well. 



Ficus repens is a little, graceful, easily cultivated 

 greenhouse climber, which hangs prettily in baskets or 

 creeps along stones in a greenhouse border. 



Every year we grow various Eucalyptuses from seed 

 some for putting out, and some for retaining in pots 

 especially the very sweet Eucalyptus citriodora, which is 

 in the greenhouse now and is a great help, as it looks 

 flourishing; while the sweet Verbenas will have their 

 winter rest, as they are deciduous, whatever one does at 



