44 



PROPAGATION AND 



[chap. 



v.ill not sink, case and a'l, after being put into warm water, and 

 remaining there an hour. 



69. But, seeds of ad sorts are, sometimes, if not always, part 

 sound and part unsound ; and, as the former is not to be rejected 

 on account of the latter, the proportion of each should be ascer- 

 tained, if a separation be not made. Count, then, a hundred seeds, 

 taken promiscuousl}^, and put them into water as before directed. 

 If fifty sink and fifty swim, half your seed is bad, and half good ; 

 and so, in proportion, as to other numbers of sinkers and swimmers. 

 There may be plants, the sound seeds of which will not sink ; but 

 I know of none. If it be found in any instance, they w^ould, I think, 

 be found in those of the tulip-tree, the ash, the birch, and the 

 parsnip, all of which are furnished with so large a portion of 

 wing. Yet all these, if sound, will sink, if put info warm water, 

 with the wet worked a little into the wings first. 



70. There is, however, another way of ascertaining this impor- 

 tant fact, the soundness or unsoundness of seed ; and that is, by 

 sowing them . If you have a ]iot-hed{oY, if not, how easy to make 

 one for a hand-glass), put a hundred seeds, taken as before di- 

 rected, sow them in a flower-pot, and plunge the pot in the earth 

 under the glass, in the hot-bed, or hand-glass. The climate, under 

 the glass, is warm ; and a very few days will tell you what pro- 

 portion of your seed is sound. But there is this to be said ; that, 

 with strong heat under, and with such complete protection 

 above, seeds may come up that would not come up in the open 

 ground. There may be enough of the germinating principle to 

 cause vegetation in a hot-bed, and not enough to cause it in the 

 open air and cold ground. Therefore I incline to the opinion that 

 w e should try seeds as our ancestors tried witches ; not by fire, but 

 by water ; and that, following up their practice, we should repro- 

 bate and destroy all that do not readily sink. 



SAVING AND PRESERVING SEED. 



71. This is a most important branch of the gardener's business. 

 There are rules applicable to particular plants. Those will be 

 given in their proper places. It is my business here to speak of 

 such as are applicable to all plants. 



72. First, as to the saving of seed, the truest plants should be 



