MAY III 



wets the leaves, but hardly affects the soil at all. 

 On the Continent, where all kinds of pot-cultivation 

 have been longer practised than in England, flower- 

 pots are often glazed outside, which keeps the plants 

 much moister, and makes less necessity for frequent 

 watering. The French, especially, understand much 

 better than we do the potting-on of plants. They begin 

 by putting seeds into pots no bigger than a thimble, 

 and sinking them in boxes with cocoanut fibre ; the little 

 plants are then potted-on very gradually, never injuring 

 the roots at all. The merciless way in which gardeners 

 often tear off the roots collected at the bottom of a pot is 

 most injurious to the plant. The large red jars that still 

 bring oil from Italy, covered with their deUghtful coarse 

 wicker-work, are useful ornaments in some gardens. They 

 are glazed inside, and boring a hole in the bottom of 

 them is not very easy work. They have to be more than 

 half filled with drainage ; and plants do not do well in 

 them for more than one season, as the surface of earth 

 exposed at the top is so small. In old days the oil 

 merchants in the suburbs of London used to cut them 

 in two vertically, and stick them against their houses 

 above their shops, as an advertisement or ornament. 

 Enthusiastic amateurs will find that they get two very 

 nice pots by sawing them in half horizontally, just below 

 the sham handles. The top part, when reversed, requires 

 the same treatment as was recommended for the Sea-kale 

 pots. Many different things may be grown for standing 

 out of doors in the large pots and tubs above described, 

 and one plant may succeed another. The first rule, I 

 think, is to grow in them those plants which do not grow 

 especially weU in your own local soil. To put into a pot 

 what is flourishing much better in a bed a few yards off 

 is, to my mind, a mistake. 



I grow in pots large old plants of Geraniums — Henry 



