294 



THE MOIST STOVE. 



the pit on the surface of the bed, and covered with hand-glasses for a 

 few days till they have taken fresh root in the new soil ; these glasses 

 must be progressively removed as the plants get established. It will 

 be necessary also to shade them during the first few days ; but this 

 shading, like the removal of the glasses, must be progressively dis- 

 pensed with. 



Their whole culture now depends on the regularity of the supply of 

 air, heat, light, and water, and as they extend in gro's\i;h, frequent shift- 

 ings, until they are of a state to take their place in the stove. 



Grafting and inarching are sometimes, but rarely, practised on stove 

 plants, and some species difficult to strike by cuttings are increased by 

 laying. 



Some sorts of stove plants, such as Jacqumia arhorea^ are propagated 

 from the leaves, which should in the case of this plant be stripped off 

 and planted round the edge of a pot, filled with sandy leaf-mould, being 

 previously well drained : in six or eight months they will send up a st€m 

 which will form the futnre plant. In like manner the genera Gloxinia^ 

 Gesneria, &c., will from leaves planted in a similar way form tubers from 

 the base of the leaf-stalk, which ^\\\\ the season following send up a 

 shoot and make good plants. This mode of reproduction is frequently 

 had recourse to in the case of succulent plants, such as Gasteria, Aloe^ 

 &c., particularly of those kinds which neither send np suckers nor divide 

 into branches ; and many species of plants produce small leaves on their 

 flower-stems, which, as in the case of Echeveria gibhiflora^ E. grandifolia^ 

 &c., if laid on the surface of the mould produce plants. But the most 

 curious mode of reproduction we think is that stated by Professor 

 Thouin, that certain flowers and fruits have this property, and as an 

 instance of the former we may state that of the corollas of the Arv.m 

 appendiculatum producing plants in the garden of the Taurida Palace, at 

 St. Petersburgh. 



LAYING TROPICAL PLANTS. 



Lading, as a means of multiplying tender exotics, is mnch less practised 

 in this country now than formerly, when the art of striking by cuttings 

 was but little understood. It is, however, stiU very uniyersally practised 

 on the continent, w^here the former and more expeditious mode is less cor- 

 rectly known. In propagating by this means some preliminary arrange- 

 ments are necessarj^, because in the cases of tall plants it would be next to 

 impossible to bring their branches down to be laid in a pot of mould upoB 



