226 General Notices. 



settes, Provins, with their hybrids, but I have never been able to strike any 

 Moss Roses in this way. (Gard. Chronicle, 1845, p. 209.) 



Chinese Primrose. — Amongst the plants which adorn the cottage window 

 none is more beautiful than the Chinese Primrose, which cheers us with 

 pretty pink flowers during the whole of the dull months of autumn and 

 winter. There are several varieties of this in cultivation, but those having 

 flowers with fringed edges are the most beautiful, and therefore should 

 always be chosen. Cottagers who have this variety should therefore care- 

 fully save seed from it, which will generally, though not always, produce 

 young plants having the same character. The seed may be sown in pans 

 filled with light soil about this season, and as soon as the plants are sufii- 

 ciently large, let them be potted off into 3-inch pots, which should be well 

 drained, and filled with about equal parts of loam, sandy peat, and well- 

 rotted manure or vegetable mould. The plants should never be watered 

 over-head, and great care must be taken that they are not over-watered at 

 the root, or they soon become sickly and die. When the 3-inch pots be- 

 come filled with roots, the plants may be shifted into 5-inch pots, in which, 

 if large plants are not wanted, they should be bloomed ; after the blooming 

 season is over, instead of throwing away the plants, let the flower-stems be 

 neatly picked off them, with one or two of the undermost leaves, and shift 

 them into 6-inch pots, placing them a little deeper in the soil, in order that 

 they may strike out new roots. Managed in this way they will become 

 excellent plants by next autumn, and will flower earlier than those raised 

 from seed in spring. If they exhibit a disposition to bloom during summer, 

 pinch off the flower-stems as they appear, in order that the plants may grow 

 strongly, which will enable them to flower well in autumn, when flowers 

 are most wanted. There are double varieties, but these are increased by 

 cuttings. (Gard. Chronicle, 1845, p. 120.) 



Destruction of the Scale. — There are no insects so annoying to the grower 

 of Orchidaceous plants as the various kinds of scale (Coccidse ;) and as 

 these plants are very generally infested with them in their native countries, 

 every importation introduces a fresh stock into our hot houses. Their 

 habits of secreting themselves amongst the sheathing-leaves of the plants, 

 renders the eradication of them at all times diflicult, and many fine young 

 growths suffer in our attempts to get at these pests. Mr. Bateman, in his 

 splendid work, suggests the use of a mixture of sulphur, camphor, &c., and 

 directs the plants infected to be dusted with it ; but, besides the unpleasant 

 appearance and offensive smell, the constant syringing washes off the 

 powder before it has had the desired effect. Being, therefore, desirous of a 

 substitute which should be readily applied, speedy in its effect, and leave no 

 traces behind, it occurred to me that spirit of wine (so much used for the 

 destruction of Acari in museums) would most likely answer the purpose. 

 My only fear was that it might damage the plant itself, and I therefore made 

 a number of trials on leaves of all descriptions of stove- plants, and in every 

 stage of growth, as a preliminary step. Finding that none of these exhibited 

 any marks of injury, I next applied it to the insects, and with most complete 



