BELONGING TO THE GENUS IXORA. 
179 
tunately the Ixoras, like many other good plants, have many enemies, and are so 
much infested with insects of all kinds as literally to be worried to death by them. 
Red spider, thrips, aphides, mealy bug, brown scale, white scale — in fact, every 
kind of insect which infests the hot-house — are at home on the Ixora ; and to eradi- 
cate these the plants are so scraped, scrubbed, sponged, and doctored, as to be almost 
constantly under treatment for that purpose, by which they are so much injured as 
rarely to produce a healthy branch or entire leaf ; and consequently, as the produc- 
tion of roots is governed by the production of branches, the plants are generally short 
of the former, and are very susceptible of injury from that great bane of good 
gardening, injudicious watering. 
In the spring of the present year, the writer visited the collection of a gentleman 
who had some very beautiful plants of Ixora grandiflora, several of which, though by 
no means large plants, would have produced from twenty to thirty fine heads of 
bloom, had it not so happened, that a careless man was set with a short stubby 
brush to wash the mealy bug from the points of the shoots around the bloom buds, 
in which they generally congregate, and so effectually did he execute his duty, as 
either to totally destroy, or so much injure them as to render the plants of no use 
whatever for the season. Thus, it will be seen that, apart from the plants being 
treated unnaturally, that is, too much nursed, the great enemies of progress are 
insects ; which either must be thoroughly eradicated when the plants are young, or 
be a constant source of trouble and vexation ever afterwards. Now, we do not say 
it is impossible to eradicate the mealy bug and scale on large plants ; as hot water 
at a temperature of from 100 to 150 degrees, thrown on the plant in the open air, 
through a fine syringe, when the plants are in a comparatively dormant state, will do 
much to destroy them, as will also " Hereman's Dilutium ; " but when the young 
brood gets into the interstices of the bark, and among the young shoots and flowers, 
it is next to impossible to get rid of them. 
From the preceding remarks it will be seen how necessary it is to guard against 
insects ; and those who are about commencing the cultivation of these, or any other 
stove plants, had better give gold for young clean plants, than even accept larger 
plants at a gift, however valuable they may be, unless they are perfectly clean. 
When a collection is once clean, there is some pleasure in its management, but to 
be constantly bug-hunting is a most irksome task. Plants purchased from the 
nurseries should also be treated with suspicion ; indeed, it is a good plan to make 
all plants perform quarantine until you are convinced they are quite clean ; and for 
this purpose they should be placed in a pit or corner of the stove, and closely 
watched, until you are quite sure they are free from insects. 
The Ixoras are all natives of tropical climates, most of them coming from the 
East Indies and China, and some of the more recent acquisitions from Borneo, 
Java, &c. We have no positive information as to the altitudinal position which 
they occupy in their native forests ; but judging from the treatment which best suits 
them in this country, we suspect they abound more as undergrowths in comparatively 
