Book II. BALSAM. **5 



before, with alum-water. Our grey-colored earth, under the black moor-earth, has the 

 same effect, being combined with aluminous salt." {Hort. Trans, vol. iv. 568.) 



6478. Propagation and culture. Hedges, who has been " very successful" in treating 

 this plant, gives the following directions. " As a succession of young plants is neces- 

 sary, I raise some each year by taking, in the beginning or middle of July, young shoots 

 with three or four joints, cutting them off close to the joint which is at the bottom of the 

 shoot ; these are planted in rich earth, in a warm border, and covered with a hand-glass ; 

 they are shaded during the middle of the day, and sprinkled with water from a fine rose 

 watering-pot, two or three times a- week, in the evening, so as to keep them moist: the 

 glass being kept close over them at all times. They will also grow by layers made in 

 July, in the same way as is usual with carnations. The cuttings or layers will be well 

 rooted by the end of August, at which time, or early in September, they must be put 

 singly into small pots, and placed under a frame, which at first must be shut up close ; if 

 they can be assisted by a temperate dung-heat, at this time, it will be better for them. In 

 the frame they must be shaded and watered as before. About the middle or end of 

 October, they are to be taken into the green-house, or other shelter, where they can be 

 protected from wet and frost ; during the winter, they must be watered once a week or 

 fortnight, as they may require. In the latter end k of May or early in June following, 

 they must be turned out into a bed of rich mould, in the open ground, to remain there 

 till September, when they must be taken up and potted, and kept protected from damp 

 and cold, as in the preceding winter. Instead of turning them out, as stated, in the 

 spring, they may be retained in pots ; but they must be shifted twice during the summer. 

 By either method fine strong plants will be formed, fit for forcing or turning out in the 

 succeeding spring. If wanted for the borders, let them be put out when all danger of 

 their sustaining injury by frost is over ; they will stand the winter in the borders, and 

 will also bear flowers, though not so well as when protected by a house. Those which 

 are to flower in pots, are taken as soon as their buds begin to swell in the spring ; all the 

 old mould being removed from their roots, they are planted in fresh earth, in pots of 

 about eight inches diameter at top, and placed in front of the green-house or peach- 

 house ; if the plants are not over large, pots of smaller dimensions should be used ; these 

 will come into flower in June. Care must be taken to supply them plentifully with 

 water whilst they are coming into bloom, and it is best to place waterpans under the pots 

 to secure a continual supply of moisture. If it is desired to have plants in flower early in 

 the spring, they must be shifted into their new pots in January, and brought forward 

 with forcing heat. The mould I generally give to my hydrangeas is a compost of loam 

 and bog-earth or leaf-mould, with a little sand, well incorporated together ; in this they 

 will produce red flowers ; if they are expected to blow blue, they must be planted in the 

 pure yellow loam." 



Subsect. 24. Balsam. I/npatieyis Balsamina, L. (Blackw. t. 583.) Pent. Monog. L. 

 and Gerania?, J. Balsamine, Fr. and Ger. and Balsamina, Ital. 



6479. The balsam is a tender annual, rising from one to two feet high, with a succu- 

 lent branchy stem, serrated leaves, and various-colored flowers. It is a native of the East 

 Indies and Japan, where the natives, according to Thunberg, use the juice prepared with 

 alum, for dying their nails red. Cultivated by Gerrard in 1596. 



6480. Varieties. These are infinite, but not so marked or permanent as to have acquired names. The 

 seed from one plant will hardly produce two alike. Double flowers are chiefly held in esteem, and espe- 

 cially those that are striped like flakes and bizarre carnations. 



6481. Propagation and culture. It can only be raised from seed, which ripens readily from semi-double 

 plants, and should not be less than three or four, or even nine years old, gardeners having experienced 

 that new seed seldom produces double flowers. The best soil is a rich loam, rather lighter than that used 

 for growing melons. At any period between the 1st of March and 1st of May, sow very thin in pots, to be 

 placed in a hot-bed, and as near the glass as possible. When the plants are five inches high- transplant 

 into No. 48. pots, one plant in the centre of each pot. As soon as the roots have filled the pots, move them 

 into pots a size larger, and repeat this operation three or four times, till at last they are in pots of eight 

 inches' diameter or upwards, keeping the plants all the while in a hot-bed or pit, and near the glass. Bal- 

 sams so treated will rise four feet high, and fifteen feet in circumference, with strong thick stems, fur- 

 nished with side branches from bottom to top, and these covered with large double flowers. (Fairiveatlier, 

 in Hort. Trans, iii. 406.) 



6482. The Amaranthus, Celosia or cockscomb, Gomphrena or globe-amaranth, Mesembry- 

 anthemum crystallinum or ice-plant, Solanum melongena or egg-playit, and most other 

 tender annuals, will attain to corresponding luxuriance, if similarly treated. 



6483. Knight, in October, 1820, sent to the Horticultural Society, a cockscomb (Celosia cristata), the 

 flower of which measured eighteen inches in width and seven inches in height, from the top of the stalk ; 

 it was thick and full, and of a most intense purplish-red. To produce this, the great object was to retard 

 the protrusion of the flower-stalk, that it might become of great strength. The compost employed was of 

 the most nutritive and stimulating kind, " consisting of one part of unfermented horse-dung, fresh from 

 the stable, and without litter, one part of burnt turf, one part of decayed leaves, and two parts of green 

 turf the latter being in lumps of about an inch in diameter, in order to keep the mass so hollow, that the 

 water might have free libertv to escape, and the air to enter. The seeds were sown in spring rather late, 

 and the plants put first into pots of four inches' diameter, and then transplanted to others a foot in dia- 



3 K 



