THE PLEASURE GROUND. 277 



be reduced, and as few of the roots injured by it 

 as possible, observing only to loosen the small fibres 

 a little at the bottom and sides of the pots, which 

 will induce them to strike freer into the fresh 

 soil. There should, also, be plenty of drainage 

 placed in the bottom of the pots, in order to carry 

 off any superfluous moisture ; and over the drainage 

 a layer of the fibrous particles, sifted out of the soil, 

 should be placed, which will also facilitate the 

 carrying off the superabundant water. Mr. M 'Nab, 

 Superintendant of the Royal Botanic Gardens at 

 Edinburgh, has lately published a small treatise on 

 the General Treatment of the Cape Heaths, which 

 contains the most valuable instructions that have 

 ever yet appeared in print on the subject, and ought 

 to be in the hands of every cultivator or admirer of 

 Ericece ; it is rendered doubly valuable by its coming 

 from the pen of one who is generally known to be 

 one of the best practical Botanists, and most success- 

 ful cultivators in Britain, and whose Heaths are 

 actually grown to the size of small trees, and many 

 of them all covered, from the edge of the pot to the 

 extremity of the plants, with beautiful blossoms. 



Mr. M'Nab recommends to be mixed along with 

 the soil, " a quantity of coarse free-stone, broken 

 into pieces, from an inch to four or five inches dia- 

 meter ; of those I always introduce a quantity among 

 the fresh earth, as it is put in. This I consider of 

 great advantage to all sorts of Heaths ; but more 

 particularly so to those- that may have been shifted 

 into a much larger pot or tub at once, than it had 

 been grown in before, or in what I would call bien- 

 nial, or triennial shifting/' 



