74 



THE GARDENER. 



getting Mignonette, will also be among the produc- 

 tions of this month. Almost every one knows that the 

 Hyacinth and Xarcissus s^row freely in water, without 

 any earth whatever, in a warm room. They are fre- 

 quently in the drawing-room at this time in glasses, 

 and they are living witnesses that the presence of 

 earth is unnecessary for plants of their nature, which 

 have extraordinary powers of absorbing moisture ; 

 whilst their bulbs constitute a temporary store of food 

 for the development of leaves and blossoms. 



Auriculas of a choice kind should be carefully at- 

 tended to, and placed in the front of the greenhouse, 

 or if under garden frames freely supplied with fresh 

 ah' eveiy fine day, but preserved from damp air, which 

 injures the leaf, and consequently the whole plant. It 

 is hardly necessary to add, that when the leaves of any 

 plants — not seasonably losing them — present a yellow- 

 ish hue, there is necessity for fresh air, light, watering, 

 or some change of treatment. 



Last year's seedlings of many of the stove plants 

 may now be forced forward, and planted out in May 

 in cold frames or protected beds, where they may ac- 

 quire sumcient hardihood, a mode of treatment which 

 advances them to their flowering period, though other- 

 wise and naturally they would not flower until the third 

 year. 



A great variety of plants may now indeed be forced^ 

 and it is one of the gardener's chief delights to antici- 

 pate nature, in the development of flowers at a season 

 when her appearance in the open garden is so cheer- 

 less. To foreign and very distant lands we are in- 

 debted for the more delicate winter bloom which de- 

 lights us ; and it is one of the most interesting facts in 

 veg-etable physiology, that plants brought from cli- 

 mates where the summers are our winters (to take the 

 most extreme case) , blow at their own proper season ; 

 they will naturally be true to thek time of blowing, 



