188 How TO Grow Cut Flowers. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

 VIOLETS. 

 The amount of capital invested in the production of 

 the violet, while seemingly small, is in the aggregate a 

 large sum. True, the greater part of it is represented 

 by labor, but in some states and localities much time is 

 devoted to its cultivation. In its native home the win- 

 ters are mild, and here it is found at its best in a night 

 temperature of from forty-five to fifty. Any attempt 

 towards forcing this sweet scented flower through the 

 application of heat, immediately defeats the object 

 sought, and natural changes of temperature that come 

 with the advent of spring, tend to gradually lessen the 

 formation of buds, and at the same time encourage in 

 their place an output of new foliage as the temperature 

 incident to the change is raised. Since the advent a 

 few years since of the disease which has proved so de- 

 structive in some localities, much discussion has arisen 

 in relation to the propagation and growth of the plants, 

 some claiming their vitality was lessened, and their lia- 

 bility to disease increased, by a division of the parent 

 stool at the expiration of the flowering season. How- 

 ever this may be, it is the system 1 have always prac- 

 ticed, and I have never been troubled with the disease. 

 This leads me to the belief that the disease is commu- 

 nicated rather than produced, and that if none has ever 

 appeared, and no interchange of plants brings it on the 

 place, it is immaterial whether the new plants are made 



