308 
THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 
thought strawberry-beds are manured too highly, inducing too large 
a growth of leaf, to the injury of the fruit. One thing is certain 
with regard to vegetation generally, that, in proportion as you 
manure highly, you must allow more room. Turnips will bulb well 
when left thickly together on a poor soil, but, if it is rich, they 
must be hoed out to greater distances, or there will be nothing but 
leaf. 
WINTER FLOWERS. 
HOSE who desire to prolong — nay, to continue — the 
treasures of Flora, wnth as little intermission as pos- 
sible, through the winter, must now make use of no 
small activity in retarding autumn flowers, and making 
provision for those intended for forcing. To this end 
the following remarks may possibly be of service to amateurs. I 
will pass by botanical rarities, and confine my observations to the 
more popular tribes, which, indeed, are far more adapted to the end 
in view. Foremost amongst these stands the Primula sinensis. In 
all establishments where winter flowers are desired, this holds a con- 
spicuous place ; and though by no means difficult to grow, yet to 
produce it at once with ease, certainty, and at the period when it is 
really wanted, requires certainly a little management. They are 
assuredly best from seed annually ; two sowings, the one in March, 
the other in May, will suffice, under high cultivation, to furnish 
flowering plants from October to the following May, or even later. 
Those of the first sowing should have been prevented from flowering 
until the end of September, by constant stopping ; these should 
now be well established in five and seven-inch pots, and the only 
conditions required henceforward to flower them well are total 
absence of frost, free watering, sometimes with clear liquid manure, 
and not too intense a light. The finest I ever saw were produced in 
a dark and damp old-fashioned greenhouse, the walls covered with 
various mosses in the most excellent health. The second stock of 
those intended for spring work should have their final shift in the 
course of September from three-inch to five and six-inch pots, 
according to the objects of the cultivator. They should have every 
flower picked off until the end of December, and will require, of 
course, the same conditions as to temperature, moisture, etc., as the 
•early sowing. These plants, it is pretty well known, are exceed- 
ingly partial to leaf-mould. This, therefore, in a decomposed state, 
should form the bulk of the compost, to which may be added a little 
sound and mellow loam, a little peaty soil, a little wood-ash, and 
charcoal of the size of peas, and a good sprinkling of a sharp and 
lively sand. 
The next popular tribe I would make a few remarks on is the 
Cineraria. This is scarcely second to the Primula for purposes of 
general decoration ; these will do well from seed. However, as the 
seedlings cannot be relied on as to colour and character, it is better 
to raise them on the sucker system. The best plan by far is to turn 
