THE MADONNA LILY 15 
bulbs due to some untoward feature of culture, handling, or stor- 
age. Commonly, edge-scale and basal rots are the results of poor 
drainage, shallow soil, heavy plastic clay, or too much decaying or- 
ganic matter, particularly raw manures in the soil. These agencies 
have a deleterious effect upon the delicate bulb tissues and start the 
rots. The decaying tissues form the best kind of medium for the 
development of molds, which in their turn are able to assist in the 
progress of the diseased condition. Manifestly, the remedy is to 
improve the faulty conditions and give the bulbs a chance to recover. 
It is well to remove the scales from the bulbs to firm tissue, and, after 
drying slightly, reset the bulbs under first-class conditions, when they 
will usually recover and make good stocks. 
Of fully a hundred samples of this type of lly disease which the 
writer has examined during the past 10 years, not one has been con- 
sidered more serious than here described. Healthy plants have actu- 
ally been grown from some of these specimens under both pot and 
field conditions. : 
Of insect enemies there are usually none which need attention 
except the green and gray plant-lice or aphids. When they occur 
either in the greenhouse or the field a spray of-nicotine sulphate 
used according to the directions on the packages, a fine tobacco 
powder or dust, or fumigation with the conventional nicotine prod- 
ucts will keep them in check. 
As with most crops, the good grower will have far less trouble 
with diseases than the poor one. Putting the plants in an environ- 
ment and under conditions suited to their needs will solve most of 
the so-called disease difficulties. 
GROWING UNDER GLASS 
The Madonna lily is perfectly adapted to be grown under glass for 
winter and spring flowering; indeed, up to about the year 1880 it 
was largely so used. It was the Easter lily up to the advent of the 
“ Bermuda lily” (Lelium longiflorum), which now comes mostly 
from Japan. 
The Madonna lily should be potted up earler, but otherwise does 
not require especially different treatment from Lilium longiflorum 
except that it can not be forced quite so hard. It is said to be 
especially impatient of high temperatures until after mid-January. 
Tt can be nicely timed for Easter, however, and late in the season it 
will stand perfectly a temperature of 65° F. at night. Liberal 
feeding with liquid manure is desirable after the buds show. 
Like the field-grown plants it should be potted comparatively 
shallow and can be allowed to root and make basal leaves in plunged 
pots out of doors, where it can remain to receive some freezing, which 
it is claimed makes it force better, although in the writer’s ex- 
perience no such difference has been observed. 
THE MADONNA LILY IN THE GARDEN 
The failures with the Madonna lily under garden conditions re- 
sult from various causes. Chief among these are bad soil mechanics, 
poor drainage, too much coddling, poor handling, too deep planting, 
and, last but not least, too much shade. 
