6o MORE POT-POURRI 



quently syringing in the summer. I have found a 

 trench a foot wide and a foot and a half deep suit it 

 best. But if the subsoil is clay or a tenacious soil, the 

 trench should be made two feet deep, the bottom six 

 inches being filled with drainage — pieces of broken 

 stones or brick. The soil with which it is next filled 

 should be peat and ordinary loam in equal proportions, 

 with a little sand and leaf -mould thrown in and thor- 

 oughly mixed with the whole. Sphagnum cut and 

 chopped into small bits — this retains the moisture, 

 which is as essential as that it should not be stagnant. 

 The young plants should be put in in the autumn pref- 

 erably to the spring. It is important that the soil in 

 which the roots are growing should vary as little as 

 possible in moistness, never getting dryer at one time 

 than at another.' 



The two Japanese grasses, Eulalia Japonica varie- 

 gata and zebrina, do not throw up their flower panicles 

 here quite early enough to come to perfection, but I 

 learnt last summer that if the cane containing the flower 

 (this is easily distinguished by feeling a certain fulness 

 near the top) is picked and brought into the house, the 

 grass will dry ; it should then be peeled off, and the 

 feathery panicles will display themselves (see illustra- 

 tion in ' English Flower Garden' ) . They make a pretty 

 and refined winter decoration, and they are just the 

 right size to mix with the red -berried pods of Iris 

 fmtidissima. The seed -branches of Montbretias are also 

 a pretty addition to a dry winter bouquet. 



Plumbago rosea is a very pretty autumn -flowering 

 greenhouse plant. It wants to be grown in a fairly 

 warm house ; but, once in flower, a cool greenhouse 

 seems to suit it well. Its growth is very different from 

 the other Plumbagos, and the pink of its flower is of an 

 unusually beautiful hue. It is not difficult to strike. 



