AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
151 
Flowers for the Lawn- 
After what we said to the ladies, last month, 
about gardening, we presume that their lawns are 
rid of every thistle and vile weed, leaving nothing 
to grow except fine, short grass and white clover. 
A dressing of old manure has been applied and 
finely raked in among the roots of the grass. The 
walks are clean, and the edges nicely trimmed. 
If any one has neglected to cut out a few circular 
or oilier fancy beds in the turf, we again urge her 
to do it now. 
If you have room for several of these beds, 
plant one with verbenas alone, arranging the colors 
as we suggested last month. As there is a great 
difference in the habits of different sorts, we will 
mention a few of known excellence. Scarlets: 
Robert Defiance, Brilliant de Vase. Whiles: 
Glory of America, Madame Leflo. Maroon: 
Uncle Tom, Cazenovia. Blue : Cerulean Orb, 
Blue Bonnet, Blue Defiance (fragrant,) Rand’s 
Blue. Purple: PurpureaOderatissima (fragrant,) 
Rachel, Sarah (striped with white,) Hiawatha 
(reddish purple.) Pink: Striped Eclipse, Eva 
Corinne, Madame Lemonnier (pink and white 
striped.) Last, but not not least, Imperatrice 
Elizabeth, (crimson and white striped.) 
Another bed you might devote to taller growing 
plants, such as lantanas, scarlet geraniums, pe¬ 
tunias, heliotropes, pyrethrums and fuchsias. 
These, arranged according to their colors, and 
tied up to neat stakes, make a brilliant show all 
Summer. For the best effect, the bed of ver¬ 
benas should be planted nearest the doors and 
windows of the house, and the lantanas &c., at a 
little distance. 
Another bed may contain perpetual roses. The 
crimson June roses should not be set on the front 
lawn, but among the shrubbery, or in the side gar¬ 
den, of which we have before spoken. They 
bloom only once a year, and after that are un¬ 
sightly. The perpetuals bloom, more or less all 
Summer, and by a little care, their foliage can be 
kept always neat. But to succed w ith this class 
of roses, requires some effort. The bed in which 
they are to stand must be trenched a foot and a 
half or two feet deep, and thoroughly manured. 
It'the soil is naturally wet, it must have six inches 
of cobble-stones at the bottom for draining. The 
bed being prepared, set out the plants two feet 
apait, and tie them to neat stakes. 
The family of perpetual or ever-blooming roses 
is composed of several distinct classes, viz : Bour¬ 
bons, Tea-scented. Bengal or China, Noisettes, 
and Hybrid Perpetuals, sometimes called Remon- 
tants. Only the last named class are perfectly 
hardy at the North ; and for those gardeners w’ho 
have no means of protecting them in Winter, we 
hesitate about advising an indiscriminate planting 
of any but these. At another time we will tell 
wiiat can be done with the tenderer sorts. 
As we are now writing with Northern and 
Western gardens in view, we will give a list of 
those hybrid perpetuals which will give general 
satisfaction : 
Augusti Mie; bright rose color. 
Baron Prevost; ilark rose, a strong grower, flower in 
clusters, an old favorite. 
Baron Hallez ; crimson purple, globular. 
Caroline de Sansal; blush, very large, good. 
Edward Jessie ; pale red, constant bloomer. 
Giant of the Battles ; scarlet crimson, one of the very 
best, should be in the smallest collection. 
La Ileine ; rosy lilac, quite large, flowers hang on a 
long time. 
Lion of the Combats ; crimson, fragrant, excellent. 
Marquis Bocella ; light pink, alw ays blooming. 
Madam Laffay ; cherry red. 
Queen Victoria ; pale blush. 
Prince Albert; rich crimson. 
We shall venture to break our resolution to re¬ 
commend only the hybrid perpetuals. A few of 
the tenderer sorts are so beautiful and so much 
more constantly in bloom, that we would advise 
to plant them, even if they perish every Winter. 
It is not a difficult matter to protect them, 
however. Bending them down and covering with 
earth as raspberries, is quite sufficient. 
Among Bourbons, we would particulary recom¬ 
mend Hermosa, pink, full, and always in flower, 
and Souvenir de la Malmaison, pale, large, very 
double, and exquisitely fragrant, perhaps the finest 
rose in the world. 
Among Chinas, Mrs. Bosanquet, charming 
blush, perfect form, often called the “ wax-rose,” 
and hardly inferior to the Malmaison. 
Among Noisettes, Aimee Vibert, dwarf habit, 
snowy white, double in clusters, a great bloomer ; 
Caroline Marinesse, white, with a delicate pink 
shade, very beautiful. 
Culture of the Dahlia 
Among autumnal blooming plants, few, if any, 
surpass the dahlia. It sends up so stately a stalk, 
its flowers are so symmetrical in form, so varied 
and brilliant in color, sporting into every shade 
except blue, that we wonder not at its popularity. 
Yet it is not without its defects. It cannot bear 
excessive heat and dryness, nor too much moist¬ 
ure, it suffers from the ravages of insects, it has 
no fragrance, and in the eyes of some amateurs, 
it is a little too regular. Still, it has great merits, 
and will never lack warm admirers. 
It is a native of Mexico, and was first intro¬ 
duced into England in the year 1789. For a sea¬ 
son little notice was taken of it. In 1804, it be¬ 
came more popular. But at that time, it was only 
a single flower, of two colors, purple and scarlet. 
Within the last twenty five years, florists have 
taken it in hand, and by long and patient cultiva¬ 
tion, have produced the present almost endless 
variety of double flowers, of nearly every color 
and shade. 
As this is the season for planting the dahlia, we 
will give some directions for the management of 
it. In preparing a border for the plants, spade it 
up a foot and a half or two feet deep, so that the 
plants may not suffer from dry weather in Sum¬ 
mer. Enrich the soil with old manure, and if it is 
naturally heavy, add to it a good coat of sand, and 
incorporate the whole thoroughly together. Then 
set your stakes firmly in the ground where the 
plants are to stand. If staking is delayed until the 
plants are set out and growing, the roots will be 
badly bruised in the operation. For the free-grow¬ 
ing sorts, the stakes should be not less than six 
feet from the ground, and an inch and a half in di¬ 
ameter. A neat way of managing stakes—where 
one has only a small number of plants—is to get 
pieces of pine sawed out, of the requisite length 
and thickness, then planed, and painted green. 
On the top of each stake, cover a small space with 
white paint, and on this write the name of each 
plant. These will last several years. 
Dahlias are propagated in several ways; by 
seed, by cuttings and by division of the roots. 
Seeds sown in a hot bed, in April, will produce 
many flowering plants the same year. The new 
plants will not resemble the parent flowers, but 
will sport into an endless variety of colors, many 
of them single, in perfect flowers, and a few per¬ 
haps, of superior quality. Cuttings may be ob¬ 
tained by plunging the roots of last year’s plants 
in a gentle hot-bed, and then taking off the young 
shoots as fast as they appear. Many plants can 
thus be obtained from a single tuber. The most 
common way is to propagate by dividing the roots. 
Early in May set the old roots in a hot-bed, or 
cover them with dnt by the south side of a wall 
or tight fence, and in a short time the buds will 
start. Then take them up, and divide with a sharp 
knife, making sure to leave a hud on each tuber. A 
tuber without a bud is worthless. Set out the 
plants at the foot of the stakes, as before directed. 
As they grow, break off all but one stalk, arid tie 
that carefully to the stake, and continue this tying 
up throughout the Summer, or the plants will be 
blown down and destroyed. If insects are trouble¬ 
some in dry weather, sift air-slacked lime over the 
plants. If the Summer is very dry, a mulching of 
fine hay or straw will be useful, more so than fre¬ 
quent waterings. 
The above treatment is the best within our 
knowledge. Yet we confess that sometimes our 
most carefully nursed plants have yielded only an 
imperfect show of blossoms, while a few surplus 
roots set out carelessly by the fence, and tied up 
to any chance stick, have far outshone the most 
skillfully and tenderly treated favorites of the par¬ 
terre—so capricious is this flower, and so varia¬ 
ble are our seasons ! Still, we are far from re¬ 
commending careless culture ; as a general rule, 
it would not succeed. 
After the plants are cut down by frost in Au¬ 
tumn, take some pleasant day in October, fo 
housing the roots. Cut off the sialks near the 
ground, leaving sufficient for fastening a label. 
Dig up the roots carefully, so as not to break them 
—a strong forked spade is an excellent tool for 
this work—and let them lie in the sun and wind 
all day, so as to become thoroughly dry. Before 
night, carry them into an airy cellar and spread 
them on shelves. If the cellar is damp, they will 
be apt to mold, if very dry they will shrivel up. 
They may be kept safely by storing them on bins 
of potatoes, partly covering them with the pota¬ 
toes. This seems to keep them in a proper and 
uniform state of moisture. Perhaps, a still better 
way is to lay them in large, shallow boxes, and 
cover thern with sand. 
We shall hardly satisfy ourselves, or our inex¬ 
perienced readers, without giving a short list of 
desirable dahlias. The following twelve may not 
be the newest and most fashionable varieties, but 
they can be relied on as firstrate : 
Agnes, pure white, excellent. 
Aurora, orange-buff. 
Baron Alderson, bright orange, each petal tip 
ped with white ; large, full, constant bloomer. 
Beauty of the Grove, salmon buff, tipped with 
purple. 
Belle de Paris, pale lilac, edged with purple. 
Bob, vivid orange scarlet, one of the best. 
Claudia, violet purple, tipped with white. 
Grand Duke, bluish lilac, globular, great bloom¬ 
er. 
Mrs. Hansard, yellow, tipped with white. 
Sir John Franklin, bufl, with salmon at the base 
of each petal. 
Sir Robert Whittington, ruby crimson, superb. 
Unanimity, scarlet and deep yellow in stripes; 
firstrate. 
-- -— ii a w —--- 
Grapes at the North.— R. W. T., Franklin 
Co., Me., asks if the Isabella grape will succeed 
as far North as 44£° by covering during the Win¬ 
ter: also the price of the Concord grape, &c. 
The Season is not long enough to ripen the Isa¬ 
bella thoroughly in so high a latitude. The writer 
of this has nearly ripened them in a neighboring 
county (Kennebec), in favorable Seasons, but they 
lacked the flavor of those grown further South. 
The Concord, which sells at $1 per vine is a good 
substitute and will probably do better in Maine. 
Delaware and Rebecca are also good varieties for 
the North, ripening earlier than the Isabella, and 
quite as hardy. 
