182 
of our readers, as they appear in a communication to Mr. Lou- 
don, and given in the ninth volume of the Gardeners’ Magazine. 
He says “ There have been various methods recommended for 
the cultivation and propagation of these showy plants, and that 
by cuttings in May, is now almost universally adopted. But I 
do not approve of this for strong fibrous-rooted, hardy herba- 
ceous plants with late autumnal blossoms ; for critical time is 
lost by the delay of striking the cuttings ; and, if they are accel- 
erated by heat and glass, they are (more than any other plants) 
debilitated, weakened, and dwarfed, and often lose their lower 
leaves by the time their flowers are open, having a faint and 
sickly appearance, instead of the vigorous growth of such roots, 
if annually parted and transplanted like perennial asters or 
other hardy and herbaceous plants. 
I recommend their voracious and very fibrous roots to be parted 
in autumn or early spring, and planted in very rich manured 
light soil, at the foot of a south or west aspected wall, with not 
more than one, two, or three branches from each root, trained 
to the wall as regularly and as thinly as a peach tree, cutting 
off all superfluous shoots and weak lateral flower-buds. They 
must, when planted, be watered in the usual way, and after- 
wards all over their leaves, with a fine rose wateringpan, lightly, 
as a fine slight shower, as often as their foliage flags, quailing 
to the beams of a powerful sun, which will sometimes be three 
times a day in the hottest weather. This will quickly re-erect 
their drooping leaves, without scorching or blistering them, 
and cause these uncommonly slow-growing plants to advance 
with a degree of comparative rapidity that is as pleasing as it 
is surprising, and their leaves will become twice as large 
as when treated in the usual way. The size of this foli- 
age, too, as in bulbous and most other plants, will indicate the 
increase of size also in the expected but as yet invisible flowers. 
Thus treated, these conspicuous plants will reach the height 
of three or four feet in the smaller sorts, and that of seven and 
eight at least, in the tallest kinds, terminating in abundant and 
most beautiful flowers, many of which will far surpass five inches 
in expansion, and with almost every colour, except deep scar- 
let and the tints of blue. 
But other aspects than the south or west, and even the open 
borders in very favourable seasons will suit the greater part of 
