HARDY CYCLAMEN. 



157 



Our subject to-day is, I think, a case in point. There is something 

 graceful, to my ear at least, and suited to my little favourites, 

 in the name of Cyclamen (a short y if you please), which is 

 altogether wanting in dear old Queen Anne's " Sow-bread." No 

 doubt whatever "Sow-bread" is descriptive — of the corms or 

 tubers, for pigs are said to delight in rooting them up and 

 devouring them, but they really are too good for pigs, and so 

 I refuse to resuscitate " Sow-bread." (I really did not mean it 

 for a pun.) As Cyclamen I first knew them, and as such will I 

 hand them on. 



Culture. — As to cultivation, they appear to present no real 

 difficulties whatsoever. They luxuriate in a light, open, porous, 

 sandy, peaty soil with limestone, or (which serves the same purpose) 

 a few handsful of fine mortar rubbish shaken in amongst them 

 every spring. They seem to prefer a slightly shaded and raised 

 place, for both in my own garden and at Messrs. Paul's nursery 

 at Cheshunt, w T here they grow so magnificently, they are planted 

 on a sloping bank at the foot of thin deciduous trees. This, 

 indeed, is the nearest approach we can give them to the natural 

 habitat of the majority of the varieties. I have found them 

 growing abundantly on the northern slopes of the hills in North 

 Italy in nothing but limestone rubble and leaf-mould. I have 

 also met with them in thin woods overhanging some of the Swiss 

 lakes, and almost carpetting the ground on the lower slopes of 

 the Uri Rothstock, so one would naturally conclude that they 

 are impatient of stagnant moisture, delight in semi-shade and 

 the roots of trees to carry off all surplus wet, but yet rejoice in 

 one or two good spring soakings, which would roughly correspond 

 to the melting of the Alpine snows. 



They are very easily raised from seed if the seeds be sown as 

 soon as ripe, but, as in the case of Hellebores, I have found dry 

 seeds very difficult, almost impossible, to germinate. The tubers 

 also are very easy to transplant, even when not at rest ; but when 

 received in a dry state, without foliage or rootlets, the beginner 

 should be careful to plant them the right way upwards — the only 

 indication, generally speaking, consisting in a shallow depression 

 in the upper side of the tuber, with an inconspicuous eye, or 

 sometimes a very small slightly protruding neck in the centre 

 of the corm, from which the leaves and flowers will spring. 

 Once planted they require little attention beyond the annual 



