HARDY CACTI AND OTHER SUCCULENTS. 25 



enough to allow this bank to become quite dry, and the plants shrivel 

 a little, and thus are ready to withstand the cold of our ordinary winters. 



Many of the Cacti are so beset with barbed spines that they are terrible 

 to handle. Gloves are worse than useless, for the spines penetrate them 

 and enter the flesh of one's hands ; and in removing the gloves the greater 



portion of a spine is broken off, leaving the barbed end buried, very hard 

 to see, and often exceedingly painful. 



I arm myself, for attending to these spitefully ungrateful plants, by 

 donning a pair of wicker cuffs, and I find a couple of long-bandied steel 

 forks, known as " Cook's forks," one in each hand, very useful for extract- 

 ing weeds or rotten pieces of Cactus. In planting^ large specimen I use 



9 



