No. 129.] 537 



As soon as the leaves of trees, such as oaks, diesfnuts, planes, 

 beech or elm, begin to fall abundantly, that is, in the first day8 

 of November, I gather them into large heaps, in a dry time, in 

 quantity sufficient for my beds during the year. A few days af- 

 ter I dig, in the dryest and warmest place in my garden, a ditch 

 six feet wide, and long enough to receive my pine apples, and to 

 a depth of about two feet. I fill it with the leaves from my heap, 

 to well heaped surfaces, the whole depth of leaves being about 

 three feet. If it is too dry, I water it with a sprinkler (watering 

 pot.) I then put on this bed of about four feet square, filled with 

 a bed of garden mould, of tan, or even crushed turf, to the thick- 

 ness of some seven inches, and then cover the whole with glass 

 frames. In a few days the heat in the tan rises to about 75° Fah- 

 renheit, and I then bury my pots (which are about five inches in 

 diameter) in the tan. I fill these pots with heath soil, leaving 

 such a space between the pots that each glass frame will cover 

 about sixty pots. The beds being thus prepared, I put the shoots 

 or the crowns of pine apples saved from the fruit on the table, I 

 plant one of these in each pot, and put them immediately under the 

 frames. Take care that the leaves of the pines never touch the 

 glass over them. Be careful to cover them up exactly with 

 straw mats every night. The young plants must be deprived en- 

 tirely of air for about six weeks, at the end of which time I find 

 they iiave taken root. During all this time they must not be wa- 

 tered. 



The humidity of the bed of leaves below is enough fur them- 

 when you are sure they are rooted, give them a little air during 

 sunshine. In this condition the plants will go through the win- 

 ter witliout any further care than heaping leaves close up to all 

 the frames and covering them with straw mats or heaps of leaves 

 or double or triple straw mats, as the cold may require- these 

 coverings are not to be removed except in mild w^eather and in 

 sunshine. In April make a new bed like the last with this dif- 

 ference, that instead of tan or mould, fill th.e trench with about 

 twenty inches depth of heath soil and when it becomes sufficient- 

 ly warm, plant in it the young pines with their soil about their 

 roots, putting six only under one square of your frame. As 



