APRIL. 
75 
Whites; General Havelock, Argus, Baron Yon Tuyll, and Marie, Blue ; Bloksberg, 
double, pale Blue ; Due de Malakoff and Ida, Yellows ; and Lord Palmerston, 
Mauve. Messrs. W. Cutbush & Son were second, with Duke of Wellington, 
Florence Nightingale, Princess Charlotte, and Yon Schiller, Beds; Grandeur a 
Merveille, Seraphine, and Mont Blanc, White ; Argus, General Havelock, and 
Bleu Aimable, Blues ; Ida, Yellow; and Bobert Fortune, Mauve. At this Exhibi¬ 
tion I noticed some other new kinds. I will leave any record of these for a future 
paper, having already transgressed reasonable limits of space. 
Quo. 
CULTURE OF THE PINE APPLE.—No. II. 
3rd. Suckers. —To grow vigorous strong plants, strong suckers should be 
selected from those stools that have produced the most superior and perfect 
fruit; and if there is not enough of those to keep up the desired stock, it is 
only needful to shake out such selected stools, repot them in smaller pots, or 
lay them in by their heels in the plunging materials of the succession-pit, 
with their leaves shortened back. In this way but little room is taken up, 
and the desired quantity of suckers may be obtained in succession at all times 
and seasons. There is a bud at the axil of every leaf, and by plunging the 
stools in a strong bottom heat and by keeping them dry at bottom and 
sprinkling overhead with tepid water, plenty of those buds will be developed. 
Their leaves may then be stripped off, their stems cut up into lengths of 
2 to 3 inches, split between the buds and laid in pans or pots, and covered an 
inch with light soil and placed in humid heat. 
There is another simple method, by pulling out a leaf here and there 
round the stem and cutting a notch just over the summit of the bud or eye. 
If the stool is not required for such a purpose, or any other, when the suckers 
are to be taken off pull up or chop it off just above the surface of the soil, 
then with a block and hatchet chop it 2 or 3 inches below the sucker, strip off 
the leaves up to the base of the sucker, trim off with a strong knife the piece 
of old stem or stalk to the length of 2 or 3 inches or thereabouts, rubbing off 
any prominent buds appearing on it, in order to prevent any ground suckers 
shooting up afterwards; then pot immediately in well-drained pots in good 
holding rough turfy soil, or stiff loam and charcoal. Plunge them when done 
in front of the succession-pit, where no shading will be required at any season 
of the year. They will there very soon get strongly rooted, so as to be shifted on, 
and get ranged at the back or middle of the pit as the large last-shifted succession 
plants get removed for filling up the fruiting-pit, which with us is pretty often, 
as we hold it good not to lose any time, but take advantage of any season when 
we can to pot or repot suckers in order to keep up a good succession of fruit. 
It is found a very ready way in attaining this object to allow a small piece of 
the old stem to remain on the sucker. It is a means of supporting it more 
firmly in the pot, and does perhaps, to a small extent, give a little assistance 
to the new-planted sucker. If the stool of a good variety or scarce kind has 
a sucker or two to be taken off and the stool is to be saved afterwards, instead of 
twisting and breaking out the sucker, with a strong knife cut it out with a 
small piece of old stem to it. This is much better than pulling it out. I 
remember between forty and fifty years back being pretty busy amongst a large 
collection of Pines. The system then, of course, was very different to that now 
followed. Fruiting plants were small and old, with narrow leaves, producing 
but small suckers and a good many of them. It was the practice then to pull 
them off, and lay them on shelves, or curbs of pits to dry and harden, or 
“ ripen ” as it was then called ; then after a time to pull off a few of the leaves 
