Feb,'] 



THE FORCING GARDEN. 



675 



be, in ordinary cases, fit for the reception of the plants. Th( 

 plants, as directed in January, being planted into pots, three 

 plants in each, the strongest and most stocky should now be 

 chosen, and removed carefully from the seed or nursing-frame 

 in a box or basket, covered over so as to prevent any accident 

 in their removal from one frame to the other. The day 

 previously to this final planting out, the plants in pots should 

 have been gently watered, which will render the balls of mould 

 round their roots less liable to fall in pieces when turned out 

 of them. 



They should now be carefully turned out of the pots and 

 planted in the hills, one pot of plants, that is, three plants 

 into each hill ; draw the mould gently round their stems, and let 

 them be planted rather deep than otherwise. The plants being 

 thus planted, give the hills a gentle watering with a fine-rose 

 watering-pot, sufficiently to settle the mould round their roots. 

 This water, as should all such that is used for watering either 

 cucumber or melon-plants at this early season, should be 

 warmed, either by being placed in the frame the day preceding 

 that on which it is used, or it may be rendered sufficiently 

 warm by the addition of water warmed for the purpose, and 

 brought as near to the temperature of the bed as possible. 

 The process of planting or ridging out being thus finished, 

 shut up the lights, till the steam rises again strong enough to 

 require to be let out by degi'ees. 



Whether cucumbers or melons be cultivated in common 

 dung-bed frames, or in pits of whatever construction, the prin- 

 ciple of temperature, planting out, &c., arc the same, with 

 this difference only, that some pits are so constructed that only 

 a small portion of steam from the fermenting matter, citlier 

 under them or from the linings by which they are heated, can 

 enter into the bed. This deficiency of steam must be supplied 

 J)y sprinkling water on the flues when they are sufficiently 

 heated. Both cucumber and melon-plants thrive much better 

 in a humid high temperature than in one that is dry, how- 

 ever warm it may be ; therefore the more they can be supplied 

 with that heat and humidity, the more likely are we to be 

 successful in their production. 



