186 
PLORICULTURAL (ECONOMICS. 
and they are likewise valuable for improving the texture of soils by keeping them 
porous. Charcoal is similarly efficacious, and for precisely the same purposes ; 
while, the more it is broken and reduced towards a state of powder, the more 
readily will it accomplish what is required. The crumbling remains of decayed 
wood are of a like nature, and calculated to be equally beneficial. Nor is any kind 
of decomposed vegetable refuse a jot the less desirable, provided it be free from the 
seeds of troublesome w^eeds, and the eggs or larvae of insects. 
A mixture, however, of three or all of these things, — including always the 
turfy loam, the leaf-mould, and either of the others indifferently, — will give the 
best approximation to the character of heath-soil ; which last, after all, is not to 
be assumed unfit for use, when it can be cheaply procured, and of a good quality : 
but which should by no means be purchased at an extravagant price while it can 
be dispensed with in this manner, especially if it be of an inferior description. 
The compost we have spoken of, is infinitely preferable to had heath-soil. 
Yet, although the practice of buying heath-mould at an extravagant cost is of 
the commonest occurrence, some cultivators are in the habit of paying large prices 
for loam of a particular nature. We have known from thirty to forty shillings 
paid for a cart-load of loam ; when a loam of a greatly more suitable character 
might have been obtained from the pastures of the estate to which it was brought. 
The chief requisites in loam that is to be employed for potting plants in are an 
open texture, a freshness and richness in salts such as an old undisturbed meadow 
will furnish, and the mixture throughout of a tolerable quantity of the roots of 
those vegetables or grasses which have been growing upon it. Almost every place 
will yield a greater or less quantity of loam such as this ; and to go to any dis- 
tance for loam of a stronger nature is as needless as it is extravagant. 
What we would say, then, to the cottager, the amateur, or the gardener, w^ho 
pays a high rate for his heath-mould or his loam, or who refrains from growing 
certain plants because he cannot get either, is to urge him to the exercise of his 
skill in mixing and preparing the soils he actually possesses, and to substitute these 
for the others. If all the vegetable refuse of a garden were collected, and all the 
small rubbish of wood, and all the fallen leaves, and these decayed in separate 
heaps, and turned over now and then during the process of decomposition, a store 
of most excellent soils would soon be obtained ; and, mixed with common garden 
earth of a mellowed and moderately rich nature, the wants of the most varied 
tribes of plants might thus be met. 
On no account, however, should any sand be put amongst the compost ; nor 
should a small proportion of broken stone or bricks ever be omitted. Soft sand- 
stone is the best where it can be had, and it should vary in quantity with the 
strength of the plant to be potted. Thus, a delicate plant, witli fine and minute 
roots will want a larger proportion ; and a strong robust specimen will require only 
a very trifling quantity. 
