226 
ON THE CULTURE OF CALLA ^THIOPICA. 
blossoms may thus be obtained. In either of these cases the plant should be fre- 
quently examined during its state of torpidity, and as soon as it is observed to 
commence growing, it should be immediately potted, and removed to where it will 
be well exposed to light, and, if possible, to air. 
With a little attention, it may be treated entirely as a border plant, but such 
a practice is usually prejudicial, as it is exceedingly difficult to preserve the roots 
sufficiently dry during the winter in the open ground. Where this system is 
adopted, the roots should be covered with a box or inverted flower-pot in w^et 
weather, as soon as the leaves decay ; and in the winter, besides this protection 
from wet, they must be covered with some dry litter to preserve them from frost. 
All circumstances considered, pot culture is decidedly the best mode, as the plants 
have a much more showy appearance when thus treated, and attain to greater 
perfection. 
This plant may be increased by separating the offsets which are formed on the 
thick, fleshy roots, in the month of August or September. They should be potted 
separately, in 48-sized pots, in the soil before recommended, and treated precisely 
as the old plants. 
This is the usual method of cultivating the plant now under consideration, and, 
where it is properly practised, is always successful. But we have promised to 
describe a new system of culture, or at least one which has rarely been adopted, 
and that is, to treat Calla ^Ethiopica as an aquatic. Few persons are, we think, 
aware of the adaptation of this plant to such a purpose, or we should more 
frequently see it flourishing in our ornamental ponds and basins. 
The great scarcity of ornamental aquatic plants, renders a knowledge of the 
above fact relative to this species peculiarly interesting ; and it has only to be 
planted out in the bottom of a basin, in which a sufficient quantity of water is 
kept through the winter to prevent the frost from reaching it, to render it at once 
a delightful and valuable addition to our aquatic Flora. As a greenhouse aquatic, 
there would be no danger from frost ; and if it were only placed (in the pot) in 
the bottom of an ornamental basin during the flowering season, it would be an 
object of great interest and beauty. It may be well to add, that the water alone 
is sufficient to support its stems, and that, when planted in the bottom of a pond, 
the flowers and leaves will invariably rise above the surface, if the depth of it is 
not more than three feet. 
The non-practical portion of the readers of this little article will perhaps 
need to be reminded, that vegetable substances rot much sooner when subjected to 
alternations of wet and drought, than they will when kept constantly immersed 
in water ; this will reconcile the apparent discrepancies in it that would otherwise 
be observable, and prove that though the plant here treated of would perish by 
being kept in the open ground, it will nevertheless subsist in the bottom of a pond, 
and sustain the constant but uniform decree of moisture which is unavoidable in 
o 
such a situation with perfect impunity. 
