62 ALPINE FLOWERS. Part I. 



to propagate and make the most of it, the true way is to sow it 

 at once instead of keeping it over the winter, as is usually done. 

 By winter the seedlings will be strong enough to take care of 

 themselves, and be ready to plant out for iiowering wherever it 

 may be desired to place them. 



But to the immediate subject of raising them in spring. Well, 

 the seeds we will suppose provided, and the month of April to 

 have arrived. If not already done, a border or bed should be 

 prepared for them in an open but sheltered and warm position, 

 and where the soil is naturally light and fine, or made so by 

 artificial means. It would be as well to prepare and devote two 

 or three, or more, little beds to this purpose of raising hardy 

 flowers. They vijould form a most useful nursery-like kind of 

 reserve ground, from which plants could be taken at any time to 

 fill up vacancies, to exchange with those having collections, and 

 to give away to friends ; for assuredly it is one of the greatest 

 pleasures of gardening to be able to give away a young specimen 

 to a friend who happens to see and admire one of our " good 

 things " in flower ; and by raising them from seed we can always 

 do this with ease. I have said that the seed-bed should be in a 

 warm position, but let it, if possible, be in or near what is often 

 called the reserve garden in large places, or, in smaller, in the 

 kitchen-garden— anywhere but in the portion of the gardens 

 devoted to ornament. If the ground happen not to be naturally 

 fine, light, and open, make it so by adding plenty of sand and 

 leaf mould, and then surface the ground with a few inches of 

 fine soil from the compost-yard or potting-shed. The sifted 

 refuse of the potting-bench will do well. Then level the 

 beds nicely, and form little shallow drills in them for the 

 reception of the seed. Let the beds be about four feet wide, 

 with a. httle footway or alley between each about fifteen inches 

 wide, and let them run from the back to the front of the 

 border, not along it. Make the little drills across the beds, and, 

 instead of making these drills with a hoe or anything of the kind, 

 simply take a. rake handle, a measuring rod, or any straight 

 thing of the sort that happens to be at hand, and, laying it across 

 the little bed, press it gently down till it leaves a smooth impres- 

 sion about one inch deep. Do this at intervals of about six 

 inches, and then your little nursery bed is ready for the seed. 

 From these smooth and level drills the seeds will spring up 

 evenly and regularly. 



