382 THE COTTAGE GARDENER. September 16. 
cutting every root, large or small, within the trench. 
We may resume this subject, in clue time, under a 
broader title, viz: —The improvement of unsatisfactory 
I fruit trees. R. Errington. 
NEW BEGONIAS—BOTTOM HEAT FOR 
TROPICAL BULBS—SEEDLING SIDONIA 
FRAUDS—EVERGREEN CUTTINGS. 
There are so many subjects pressing on me just now 
that I can only afford space to notice some of them in 
this fashion. Through the kindness of a correspondent 
I have had a private view of two beautiful cross seedling 
Begonias, and one of them is the finest flower of that 
family that I have yet seen. The flowers are larger 
than those of Begonia nitula, and nearly as high- 
coloured as B. fuchioules ; and although I have seen the 
wholo of our Begonias in bloom, and have bloomed 
most of them myself, I could not take upon me to say 
which two produced this cross, yet they give me credit 
for knowing as much about crosses as most people. One 
of the parents is Cinabarina, and the other parent—a 
bulbous species—is now lost to England, and was only 
in the possession of our correspondent who effected the 
cross, and lost this new one directly afterwards. I hope 
he will yet be able to reintroduce it from South America. 
But should it not be met with again in our days, we 
should not regret, after a cross has been so cleverly got 
from it, and that, too, one of the very best flowers of the 
family. The othor seedling is a double flower; a cross 
also from Cinabarina. I believe this is the first appear¬ 
ance of a disposition to form double flowers that has 
been observed in this order, and who knows but this 
may throw some light on the real affinity of Begoniads; 
for that is the case in dispute among the most learned 
to this very day. At any rate, the disposition is evident 
enough in this case, although the stamens are not 
wholly turned into leaves, or what a botanist would call 
petaloid sepals, and the disposition ought certainly to he 
encouraged, and followed out until we have Begoniads 
as double as a Guelder rose. 
Another correspondent raises the subject of bottom 
heat for plants set out in the open air, and says, “ there 
is no end to the catalogue of what might be grown and 
done in such a place, if made permanent, with the 
capability of a temporary glass winter covering. I only 
instance the successful cultivation and determination of 
species of a host of Amaryllids, and other mystified 
families.” I cannot let this last suggestion pass without 
adding to it a suggestion or two from the writings of 
the late much lamented Dr. Herbert, the greatest bulb 
grower, and the most proficient botanist, among bulbs, 
that England has yet produced, or is likely to produce 
in our times ; and to the whole I add, “ So is it,” from 
the surface of my own experience. “ The vigour,” said 
Dr. Herbert, “ with which mules of the genus Crinum, 
and many other plants, grow out-of-doors against the front 
wall of a stove, persuades me that a great variety of 
plants might, with a little care, be cultivated better in 
the open ground than under glass, if the border in which 
they are to grow were flued (heated) under ground.* * * 
There are many plants which seem to enjoy a cool 
atmosphere, but will not flower or thrive vigorously 
without the stimulus of heated earth at the root. * * * 
I believe the genus Hedychium, and many others, would 
flower perfectly with the assistance of fire in summer, 
requiring nothing in winter but a covering to throw off 
the wet. With occasional heat to the flue (bottom heat) 
during the early summer, and perhaps in severe frost, 
Amaryllis, Brunsvigia, Buphane, Nerine, I [amianthus, 
and all the allied genera of African bulbs, as well as the 
South American, would certainly succeed better than 
with any other treatment. I believe that not only thoso, 
but even some of the tropical Crinums, would succeed 
better so than in a stove, and probably many shrubs 
that might not be expected to live there.” ( Amaryllid- 
acea, 402.) Two divisions of a turf-pit, with bottom heat 
from a rude tank of wood, and a little cast-iron boiler, 
such as you see sometimes in a back-kitchen, would 
prove all the bulbs in our dictionary, and also all the 
tuberous-rooted plants, as Ginger, Hedychium, &c. The 
reason for two compartments is, that many bulbs, as 
the true Amaryllis, grow only in winter, while the 
greater number of the plants thus suggested might he 
made to rest during the winter, if, indeed, that was not 
their natural habit, and therefore all they would require 
would be dryness and exemption from frost in the dark, 
while those that were green and growing, would need 
glass for light and protection. All those beautiful plants 
with variegated leaves, now attracting such general 
interest that collections of them are exhibited at every 
plant show round London, might, no doubt, be grown 
on this plan, and look ten times more beautiful and in¬ 
teresting in their peculiar markings than they now do 
under our best system of pot culture. Every one of the 
Achimenes would live out any of our winters if planted 
close to the wall of a stove where pipes or flues passed 
inside the house. The old A. coccinea, and the blue 
longijlora, lived so with me for six years, and the latter 
flowered every year in September. With a direct bottom 
heat I have no doubt they all would flower from the 
middle of July out right in the open air. 
I have also been favoured with a truss of the new 
cross from Sidonia, the striped bedding geranium, with 
this farther account of it—“ Young Sidonia is somewhat 
improved in form, and unique in its exquisite colour." 
I never paid any attention to what is called improved 
forms in flowers, therefore my authority can carry no 
weight on that head, but the “ exquisite colour ” 1 can 
vouch for, and the one that gives the nearest idea of it 
is Diadematum bicolor. I am delighted to be made the 
Secretary in matters of crossing, and now I find some 
difficulty in withstanding the temptation offered by the 
pollen of new and rare seedlings sent to me. Indeed, I 
have been under the necessity of taking the pledge to 
my own conscience, that I shall never take advantage of 
this trust; and I may as well explain howl might do so, 
as I know very well that all the gardeners in the world 
will not take this kind of pledge. Mr. A. B. C., in 
Edinburgh, raises a fine new seedling, and sends it to 
D. B., in London, to hear what they think of it in the 
south. The Londoner, having an eye to business, like 
a hawk, makes a fresh cut on the footstalk of the 
flower, and puts it in water; in a few days some more 
of the buds open, and ripen the pollen dust. While 
this is getting ready he looks out for an improved 
variety of the same kind of flower, and on it ho dusts 
the pollen from the Edinburgh flower. The northern 
grower may have spent ten years, and failed in one 
hundred experiments, before he obtained that beautiful 
flower, but he in Loudon takes the advantage of him ; 
and having got into that strain, by merely ripening the | 
pollen from a bud sent him, he will be in the market ; 
with on improved race of that flower as soon as the 
great discoverer himself—perhaps sooner; and being at 
the head or heart of the trade, he will have the farther \ 
advantage of making his new seedlings better, and much i 
sooner and easier, known than if he was in Edinburgh, 
and all this at the expense, and to the prejudice of him 
who toiled and spent his brains on the original experi- j 
ments. It is reported of two nurserymen, long since [ 
gone to their account, that one of them raised a now 
Magnolia from American seeds, hut not being quite sure 
that it was really a new one, he sent a man with a piece 
of it to the other nurseryman, who was a better plants- 
man, to see what it was, and to hear his opinion on it. j 
This second dealer did not keep confidence with his I 
