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PRIZE FUCHSIAS — POTTED PLANTS — THE POPPY. 
to accomplish this, is to select each year for 
seeding from those which possess some one or 
other of these properties in a marked degree, 
or at least show some approach to it. One 
flower may be larger, but no better, and 
another may be smoother on the edge, a third 
may be finely marked, a fourth a brighter 
colour, and so on, but in all other respects 
may be no better, perhaps something worse ; 
but by seeding from these, and none but these, 
and again selecting from the produce the best 
for seed-bearing, and persevering carefully in 
this course, success in time must follow. 
Then, if double flowers are desired, the seed 
must be saved from double flowers ; but as 
these may be already found, the first selections 
of double should be purchased, and for the 
purpose the very best should be chosen. 
PRIZE FUCHSIAS. 
There are enough Fuchsias now to entitle 
any one to show none but well contrasted 
flowers, that is to say, flowers of which the 
corolla is one colour, and the sepals another. 
There is hardly an excuse for growing or 
exhibiting a self. We have pale rose or flesh 
coloured flowers, with purple or deep crimson, 
or violet corollas; and whites, with all sorts of 
corollas ; so that selfs, or flowers in which the 
sepals and corolla are alike, or even the same 
cast of colour, ought really not to be tolerated 
by florists, unless they are very novel indeed 
in some points, and that novelty is good. The 
great bulk of the flowers now in cultivation, 
present the too usual sameness of most things 
of which there are many. The same kind of 
flowers comes from seed in twenty different 
people's bands, and each thinking he has a no- 
velty, although nothingto boast of, gives his pet 
a name. They are not exactly alike, it is true, 
but they are not sufficiently distinct to look well 
in the same collection ; and unless the thing 
has been submitted to, and noticed by, some 
one in the habit of seeing all that are good for 
anything, nobody can tell what he is biding. 
For instance, he orders the best he can hear 
of, at the prices advertised, and, at blooming 
time, he finds several so much alike as to 
thoroughly disappoint his hopes and expecta- 
tions. This season we have great promises 
and various challenges, and perhaps more real 
good ones than usual ; but there are some too 
much alike to be of much use in the same 
collections. The raisers of many new ones 
are doing their best to show specimens ; but 
in judging the new ones it must be borne in 
mind, that small plants will show the habit as 
well as large ones, and that the habit will 
decide the claims of a plant when the flowers 
are at all equal. Again, it should be remem- 
bered, that the true habit of a plant is best 
shown by exhibiting it in its natural growth 
without pinching in the tops to make it 
bushy, or otherwise artificially assisting its 
appearance ; and we should recommend every 
one to show two plants, one cultivated as well 
as it can be by pruning, the other grown as 
well as it can be without cutting at all. 
POTTED PLANTS. 
All plants in pots, when exposed to the sun 
and wind, require frequent watering, and 
simply because the pots dry fast, and then 
the fibres of the plants suffer directly. This 
would seem to demand that when pots are in 
the open air they should be plunged; but there 
is another mischief awaits them if this be 
done : worms get into the pots, and the roots 
get out of the pots, and striking into the earth, 
excite a growth which is not desirable while 
there, and receive an awful check when the pot 
is removed, and the roots that have struck 
through into the ground are broken off, be- 
cause the plant has depended on them for all 
its extra growth. It has been found the best 
plan to place the pots on ahard bottom — paved, 
cemented, bricked, slated, tiled, or otherwise 
firm and waterproof ; to place them as close 
together as they will stand, in breadths of six 
feet, and any length, with the ends south and 
north, and the sides, of course, east and west. 
If they are to remain on the same situation all 
the summer, it will be worth while to pack 
them, as it were, in ashes or gravel, or other 
naturally dry material, because the watering of 
the pots will moisten whatever they are packed 
in, while the hard bottom will prevent the wet 
from lodging. The roots will even here strike 
through the bottom of the pot ; but, in the 
first place, there is less disposition, because 
the hard bottom, and the ashes or gravel 
will not be so inviting as the common earth ; 
and they will greatly protect the sides of 
the pots from sun and wind, and thus keep up 
a moisture among the fibres that have reached 
them ; but if the pots have no packing, an 
occasional examination and constant watering, 
when the sun goes down, will make all but the 
outside rows pretty safe, and a row of turves, 
or a foot walk or a piece of plank along the 
sunny side, will always protect them enough. 
THE POPPY. 
This gaudy flower is only fitted for any large 
garden, and it requires no little attention to 
keep it from spreading all over a place, and 
degenerating to any common and ugly semi- 
double subject. The great fault of the Poppy 
is its flimsy nature, and the short-lived beauty 
of the bloom in consequence of it. The flower 
is hardly full blown before the petals begin to 
fall, and unless the seed-pods are constantly 
