32 
NAT. ORDER. — PRIMULACE^. 
March, or April. The seed should be sown over the surface quite 
thick, and covered in very lightly, and the boxes or pots placed where 
they may have a little of the morning sun, but avoid the mid-day 
heats. The plants may be much forwarded by plunging the pots or 
boxes into a mild hot-bed ; in the spring, when dry, they should be 
frequently refreshed with water, in very moderate proportions at a 
time, removing the plants more into the shade as the heat advances, 
as it soon destroys them. 
It is necessary, in order to keep up a good stock of plants, to 
raise new seedling plants every two or three years, as the old plants 
mostly decline in beauty after the third year. In the latter method, 
the roots should be parted in the beginning of the autumn, as soon 
as the flowering is over, and it may likewise be done early in the 
spring ; but the former is the best time, as the plants get stronger 
and flower better in the spring. 
In performing the work the plants should be taken up out of 
the ground, and each branch divided into several slips, not too small, 
unless where a great increase is wanted, being careful to preserve 
some root to each slip ; they are then to be planted in a fresh dug 
border, enriched with dung as above, setting them five or six inches 
asunder, giving them water directly, and repeating it occasionally, 
till they have taken good root. All the approved sorts may in this 
way be easily preserved. 
These plants, it has been observed, are very liable to the depre- 
dations of snails and slugs, in the spring of the year ; the plants and 
pots therefore should be carefully examined on all sides early in the 
morning. But their worst enemy is a small red spider, or Acarus, 
which in summer forms its web on the under side of the leaves. — 
These little insects are scarcely visible without a magnifying glass : 
they cause the leaves to become yellow and spotted, and eventually 
destroy the plant ; they multiply with such rapidity as to take pos- 
session of a whole collection in a very short time. Such plants as 
appear infected should therefore be selected from the rest, taken up, 
