Advantages of a Reserve Garden. 343 



Any one who is acquainted witli the various operations ne- 

 cessary, through the year, in the routine of general gardening, 

 will, I make no doubt, readily admit that the proper grouping, 

 or placing, of plants and flowers, with reference to their cul- 

 tivation, is of the greatest importance in facilitating business; 

 and also in conducting the various processes requisite with 

 success : according to the old maxim, " Business well planned 

 is half done." 



The purposes to which a reserve ground may be applied are 

 very numerous ; and I will first enumerate such descriptions of 

 plants as should always gain admittance there, as far as I can 

 call them to remembrance. Choice annuals, perennials, and 

 various tender plants for planting in beds or masses, as well as 

 for the general decoration of flower borders, to be propagated 

 and cultivated, and accelerated or retarded, as may be required, 

 so as to produce a long line of succession, as well as a continual 

 gaiety in the decorative parts of the grounds. Besides this, the 

 reserve ground is useful for rearing American plants, both for 

 planting beds and borders, for forcing early flowers where 

 they are desired, for keeping pot plants of various kinds from 

 the house during summer, such as some of the New Holland 

 tribes, the jEriceae, the camellias, the Cacteae, the Geraniaceae, &c. 

 Also for pots of lilacs, honeysuckles, peaches, cherries, straw- 

 berries, &c., for forcing; and for the cultivation of violets, lilies, 

 and other scented flowers, to please the ladies in the gloom of 

 winter ; together with many other plants which I cannot now 

 think of, but which would soon find their way in the reserve 

 garden when once such department was established, to the great 

 relief of the borders of the kitchen-garden and slips, where such 

 plants are generally found scattered in all directions. 



Bulbous roots of various kinds, which have been forced, may 

 be here brought round again in the reserve garden by proper 

 care and cultivation ; and such of the Cape bulbs (as many of the 

 ixias, sparaxises, gladioluses, &c.) as will grow out of doors in 

 protected situations may be here cultivated to some extent, for 

 flowering in long succession in the houses. Rhododendrons, 

 azaleas, kalmias, and other choice bog plants, may also be 

 raised from seed, and transplanted and cultivated here, both for 

 decorating the grounds, and for furnishing abundance of nice 

 flowering plants for forcing purposes: by such means the green- 

 house, conservatory, or show-house, as well as the flower-baskets, 

 &c., in the drawingroom, may be kept constantly supplied with 

 abundance of showy, choice, and scented flowers, from Decem- 

 ber all through the spring. At the moment I am writing 

 (Jan. 6.), I have abundance of lily of the valley, in pots, in 

 beautiful bloom ; and which I have had continually since the early 

 part of December ; Neapolitan violets also> in frames, I have had 



