260 On the Cultivation of the Azalea Indica. 



inches long, and in October was making side shoots ; I now 

 removed it to a light shelf in the green-house, which was 

 both high and dry, where it remained growing during the 

 winter, and in February following its main shoot was fifteen 

 inches high ; in March I shifted it into a large flat garden 

 pot, for the purpose of laying down the side shoots, and 

 returned it to its situation in the green-house until June, 

 when it was placed in a cold frame facing the sun, that 

 I might better attend to its propagation ; in this situation 

 I obtained from it, by September 1811, seven established 

 plants from layers, and in October put three of them on a 

 high shelf in the hot-house, and the remainder, with the 

 parent plant, on the shelf in the green-house. The plants 

 put into the hot-house did not survive the winter ; but those 

 in the green-house, although they did not grow much, con- 

 tinued in good health. 



Having procured a further supply by laying down two of 

 the young plants, I put some of them in loam, some in sharp 

 sandy peat, and others in a mixture of both, when the whole 

 of those in loam, and part of those in the mixture went off ; 

 but as those in sandy peat survived, I judge this to be the most 

 proper soil for them ; but even in this many of them will go 

 off, and I therefore recommend every possessor of this fine 

 plant to increase it as much as possible, which may very 

 readily be done either by layers or cuttings ; in the former 

 way, lay down such shoots as are nearest the ground when 

 they are neither too young nor fully grown, that is, when 

 the bark begins to turn brown ; keep the top of the shoot 

 about an inch out of the ground with its leaves on, and put 

 about an inch or an inch and a half of the shoot (from 

 which the leaves should be taken, ) under ground ; the bark 



