76 CULTURE OF BULBOUS ROOTS IN ROOMS. 



Forced bulbs are seldom good for any thing after- 

 wards ; however, those who wish ; to preserve thern 3 

 may immerse them wholly in water for a few weeks ; 

 and then having taken them up, and dried them in 

 the shade for a few days, they may be planted in a 

 good soil, when they will sometimes flower the second 

 year. It does not clearly appear in what way the 

 water operates when the bulb is wholly immersed ; 

 but it is certain that bulbs so treated increase in size 

 and solidity by it, and have an incomparably better 

 chance of flowering the second year, than those which 

 have not been so treated. Most probably their total 

 immersion enables them to obtain a greater proportion 

 of oxygen from the water. 



Nosegays should have the water in which their ends 

 are inserted changed, on the same principle as bulbous 

 roots ; and a much faded nosegay, or one dried up, 

 may often be recovered for a time, by covering it with 

 a glass bell, or cup, or by substituting warm water for 

 cold. 



Very fine Hyacinths have been grown in a drawing 

 room, in the following novel manner. A quantity of 

 moss, classically called hypnum, and vulgarly fog, 

 was placed in a water-tight box, about eight or nine 

 inches deep, into which the bulbs were placed at the 

 end of September, without mould, and duly watered. 

 The result of this experiment was highly favourable; 



