I02 



DAFFODILS. 



pect, to be planted in good, rich, turfy pasture, with the 

 addition of sea sand, and by all means ample depth of 

 soil, with good drainage. For white trumpet daffodils 

 coarse, gritty stones, roots or fibres of trees, may be 

 mixed with the soil, and, in a good position, they will 

 live and thrive for years, and increase rapidly. Above 

 all things, rank, rich manure must be avoided — it is de- 

 structive. For small dwarf roots, with thread-like 

 rootlets, that are more or less naturally surface-feeders 

 — pallidus prascox, for instance — adopt shallow plant- 

 ing ; but for tall-growing kinds, such as trumpet maxi- 

 mus, all the bicolors, etc., the bulbs may be planted to 

 the depth of five or six inches, provided the soil be 

 well trenched and drained, as before mentioned. With 

 these particulars as to soil, let me add, get supplies from 

 healthy stocks, and plant early. 



In attending the London daffodil sittings, the second 

 week in April, for two seasons. I have been charmed 

 with the magnificent display at South Kensington, yet 

 nearly all are obliged to be "cut in the bud" three or 

 four days prior, and opened under glass. Last sea- 

 son they would have had no show but for adopting this 

 precaution. Still, blooms cut in the bud and forced 

 into flower in this way are never full size, as we get 

 them in the open, in south of Ireland, from the first 

 week in March. Now in Holland they also adopt this 

 plan. Indeed, I was getting "specimens" posted me 

 from the Dutch the 12th of May last year, an extraor- 

 dinarily late period for trumpet daffodils. The very fact 

 of our early bloom in Ireland, followed by the early 

 ripening of the bulbs, illustrates the point as to why old 

 Irish gardens should possess the white trumpet sec- 

 tion in reserve, when they were nearly extinct in 

 England. 



New Year's Day will give me my first blooms of 

 Ard-Righ, or Irish King. This we potted and plunged 

 in ashes against a south wall in August, bringing it into 

 a temperature of from forty to fifty degrees night and 

 day. But many of the growers near rich, prosperous 

 towns in England, who grow large quantities for cut- 

 ting purposes, and who keep the pots or boxes in one 

 continuous temperature of from fifty to sixty degrees. 



have had supplies a week before Christmas. Daffodils, 

 as a rule, won't stand much heat, unless such as are 

 vigorous. This one combines all the qualities neces- 

 sary. Tenby is another good-constitutioned daffodil. 

 Pallidus prsecox is early, but rather delicate with the 

 market growers of England. Here it does admirably, 



and when it gets nat- 

 uralized will be better 

 still. Princeps i s 

 another grand flower 

 to force, and so is the 

 Irish form of tela- 

 monius plenus. No- 

 bilis, from the south 

 of France, promises 

 well as a market 

 plant. Of this, after 

 another season, I will 

 speak with more con- 

 fidence. 



I now give dates at 

 which the principal 

 varieties give their 

 first bloom on my 

 grounds (open air), at 

 Temple Hill, Cork. 

 The soil a rich pas- 

 ture field, and the 

 manure none; Trum- 

 pet section, first av- 

 erage bloom : — Ard- 

 Righ, or Irish King 

 ^Fig. 3), February 

 loth ; under glass 

 about New Year's 

 Day ; Golden Plover, March 4th ; Giant Irish Prin- 

 ceps, February 24th ; Horsfieldi, March loth ; Tenby, 

 February 26th ; Nobilis, March 6th ; Pallidus prascox, 

 January loth ; Variiformis, March 2d ; Telamonius 

 plenus, February 28th : Copax, March 5th ; Rip Van 

 Winkle (Fig. 4), February 22d ; Leda, March 2d. 

 Cork, Ireland. Wm. Baylor Hartland, 



Fig. 4. Rip Van Winkle. 



