HORTICULTURAL JOURNAL. 71 



For a few weeks after being potted, no water should be given, the soil will 

 afford sufficient nourishment until rooting. Much water is injurious at all 

 times, but this is the most particular stage of their growth. The tuber will 

 not send out roots at all if the surrounding soil is kept constantly wet. I 

 have been informed by those who have gathered them from their native 

 habitats, that they are found frequently in marshy situations, inferring from 

 this that a bountiful supply of water would be necessary in their artificial 

 treatment. Such however, is not the fact. It is possible, indeed probable, 

 that at particular seasons they would exist in such a situation, but if the 

 same locality were visited when the plants are dormant, these conditions would 

 be found reversed, at least, under artificial treatment, they will certainly 

 perish if treated as sub-aquatics. 



When they are past flowering and give evidence of maturity, they should 

 be set out in the sun, and after the foliage is withered and cut down, the 

 tubers should be carefully removed and kept dry until they again show symp- 

 toms of growth. Of course, this treatment applies more particularly to those 

 that form tubers. Those that do not, as Lobbianum, should be increased 

 from cuttings and a young stock kept on hand ; young plants of this variety 

 set out in the flower beds in May will flower all summer, and form a fine 

 object trained on a large trellis; cuttings set clown in August and potted in 

 October will flower early in spring in the greenhouse. Many beautiful 

 hybrids have been raised by crossing this with the common Nasturtium. 

 Cuttings strike root freely under careful treatment, but the simplest method 

 of increase is by seeds, which ripen readily on most kinds, and if attention 

 is given to hybridizing the various colors, much improvement might be made 

 both in regard to color and size of flower, and there is no reason why they 

 might not be produced as beautifully spotted and in as great variety as 

 Calceolarias. G. S. 



For the Florist and Horticultural Journal. 



THE PRIMROSE, COWSLIP AND POLYANTHUS. 



Dear Sir: — I presume that yourself and your numerous and intelligent 

 readers will begin to think me a very monotonous and single class writer ; 

 but at the risk of being thought somewhat of a " curiosity man," I will ven- 

 ture once more to introduce to notice yet another of my idolized darlings — 

 or rather, three of them under one subject — the Primrose, Cowslip and Poly- 

 anthus. The same culture answers for the trio, and they are otherwise so 

 closely related in "kith and kin" that it would be superfluous to divide them. 



In a natural state they are almost exclusively confined to Britain and the 



