64 FAMILIAR GARDEN FLOWERS. 
or newspaper, or in a bell-glass placed mouth upwards, to 
ripen; then, as they arrive at perfection, the seeds will be 
shed, and none will be lost, and if the plants were good, the 
seed will pay for the trouble of saving. 
It is a very strange thing, and hardly to be believed, 
that there is not to be found in any systematic treatise on 
gardening a really good code of balsam culture. In plain 
truth, the books are all wrong upon the subject, and as the 
opportunity 1s now offered to put them right, we propose 
to do so. Let it be understood, then, to begin with, that 
the night way occasions less trouble than the wrong way, 
and the result is a free development of healthy leafage and 
splendid flowers. The essence of the proceeding consists in 
growing the plant generously and somewhat rapidly from 
the first, and guarding it against any possible check. Sup- 
pose we desire to have a fine bed of balsams. We secure 
the very best seed, and sow it in light rich soil, in pans or 
boxes, in the month of April. These pans or boxes should 
be placed on the sunny shelf of a greenhouse, or in a warm 
corner of a pit, and be kept moderately watered. The 
plants will soon appear, and as soon as they have about 
three rough leaves, they should be pricked out, three or 
four inches apart, in other boxes, in light rich soil; or be 
potted separately in thumb-pots, and be again nursed in 
the warm pit or greenhouse, where they should have plenty 
of air, and never suffer in the least through lack of water. 
If they grow fast, and the weather is too cold to permit of 
planting them out, give them a shift into 60 size (three- 
inch) pots before they become pot-bound, for, as remarked 
above, there must be no check whatever. When the 
weather is warm and dull, say about the first or second 
week in June, plant them out in a sunny position, in rich 
