October 18. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
29 
Radzivill, Queen of Roses, Raphael, Sarah, Spring- 
field Rival, Standard of Perfection, and Yellow Stan 
dard. The best fancy dahlias of 184? have appeared 
in such small numbers in the first winning stands 
this season that it is hardly worth mentioning them. 
This indicates a more rapid improvement in the 
“ fancies” than in the old kinds. Hermione, Mr. 
George Clayton, Roi do Pointilles, and Vicomte de 
Ressequeir, were the only fancy ones of 1847 which 
stood their ground this season, and of these only two 
came out in London—Hermione and the Vicomte de 
Ressequeir. To be in the fashion, therefore, whether 
in dress or in dahlias, we must keep buying novel¬ 
ties every season. Nevertheless, there are several 
good fancy dahlias that were in high repute as late 
as 1847, and would still improve the stock of many 
an honest grower who could admire them at home 
without going to the fuss of cooking them for exhi¬ 
bitions, and as they must now be very cheap, 1 shall 
give their propagation, culture, and every other topic 
connected with their management that I can think of. 
♦Adolphe Dulras, nankeen and 
white tips .. .. 3 
Bouquet de Brueil, scarlet and 
white tips .. .. 4 
Erzherzog Stephan, white with 
violet purple .. .. 4 
Harlequin, scarlet and white tips 4 
*Hcrmiouc, scarlet and white 4 
Ludwig Pemsl (sounds as Pem- 
sel), maroon and white .. 3 
♦Madame Wachy, purple and 
white tips.. .. .. 3 
♦Mimosa, deep yellow and white 
tips—quite a dwarf. 
Mr. George Clayton, white and 
purple .. .. .. 4 
Pantaloon, crimson, tipped 
white .. .. .. 4 
♦Roi de Pointilles, maroon and 
white .. .. .. 4 
Surprise, purple and white .... 3 
Vicomte de Ressequier, light 
purple and white .. .. 5 
I had no opportunity of seeing the new fancy seed¬ 
lings of this season, but a friend writes me word 
that they are few in number, and not much in ad¬ 
vance of the older ones, and that “ one called Eliza¬ 
beth is the best of them, and will be the only one 
which can stand against foreign competition next 
season, if the growers have not joined in the mad 
revolutions, and forgot their seedlings.” 
Storing Dahlias. —When the leaves are blackened 
by the frost, let the stems be cut down at once to 
within six inches of the ground; but the longer they 
are left after this in tire ground, if safely secured 
from frost, the better, as, like all other plants, their 
buds for next season’s growth will swell much after 
close pruning, and the neck from which these buds 
issue will ripen and get so firm that the roots, or 
rather the tubers, will keep much better through the 
winter than if they are taken up quite green as soon 
as the tops are killed. Some people recommend a 
little soil to be drawn over them at this stage to pro¬ 
tect them from the frost, but surely this comes of not 
considering the subject properly. The very reverse 
is a much better plan. If you draw the soil away 
from them so that the upper part of the tubers is 
exposed to the sun and air, will they not harden and 
swell out the buds for next season much better than 
if you bury them to blanch in damp soil? 1 have 
seen them thus treated, and they answered better 
than by any other way; not one out of a hundred 
damped off in winter, and the only protection they 
received from frost was a couple of liandsful of litter 
from the stables tied up in little fiat bundles; and a 
boy went round in the evenings with a barrowful of 
these bundles, and threw one over each root. In the 
morning he collected them into the barrow again, 
and set them out of sight for the day. 1 have seen 
the dahlia frosted in September, and thus kept in the 
ground till Christmas; and I am strongly of opinion 
that our injudicious mode of pulling them up as soon 
as the tops are gone is the real cause of their dege¬ 
nerating so fast. Their buds for next year are only 
in what a physiologist would call the first stage of 
irrcipiency when they are overtaken by the frost; we 
hurry them into dry sheds, vegetation is arrested, and 
next spring we complain, “ How badly my daliliashave 
broken this spring,” and three or four such “ bad 
broken” seasons are enough to wear out a beautiful 
flower that ought to last a dozen or fifteen years. 
This evil is much aggravated by too much cutting 
“ for stock” in the spring ; and before we have time 
to learn their names properly they are gone—“ and 
where are they ?” Where, indeed ! 
But there is another side to the question: “ If 
dahlias will improve, as you say, by beiug kept in 
the ground so long, would they not be still farther 
improved provided we could keep them in the ground 
from year to year?” Now, this is a fair specimen of 
the way some people “jump at conclusions,” without 
understanding what they read. 1 did not say that 
dahlias could be so improved, nor do 1 believe that 
they, or any other plants, can be improved by any 
process whatever, farther than what is stamped on 
them at the moment of impregnation, but 1 know 
that wiser heads are of a contrary opinion. The sum 
of my argument goes no farther than that we should 
ripen the tubers before wo store them away for the win¬ 
ter, as far as our climate, aided by our own ingenuity, 
can effect, in order to enable them to retain their 
original characters as long as possible. Now, if you 
keep them in the ground from year (o year you are 
grieviously wrong, as by that means you disturb the 
“ balance of power,” as diplomatists say, between the 
roots and the branches. Let the roots be once estab¬ 
lished that way in strong rich soil, and they will 
send more water up into the stems and leaves than 
the latter are able to digest under an English sun, 
and the immediate consequence is a falling off of the 
best properties of the flower. A wet season, a rich 
damp border, or a highly-manured bed, does the same 
thing with our fancy dahlias, and turns them into 
“sell's,” or one colour, in a few months, and yet we 
cannot read the lesson, or if we do we neglect to turn 
it to useful account. Meantime let us ripen our best 
dahlia roots; then take them carefully up, cut down 
the remaining part of the stems to within an inch of 
the tubers, dry them slowly in an airy room or shed, 
and then store them away. D. Beaton. 
GREENHOUSE AND WINDOW 
GARDENING. 
Camellia. — This family of beautiful evergreen 
hardy greenhouse plants was named in honour of 
George Joseph Camellus, a celebrated Jesuit who 
travelled in the East. It belongs to the lbtb class 
of Linmeus, and the natural order Ternstroemiaceae. 
Camellia Japonica was an inhabitant of our green¬ 
houses more than a century ago. it is doubtful to 
whom we are indebted for the introduction of some 
of the superior kinds at a more modern period. The 
late Mr. Main, well known for his many excellent 
works upon gardening, was sent out to China as a 
collector in 1792, by Mr. Slater, of Low Leyton, in 
Essex; but, though ho packed the double white, the 
double red, and the double striped, for that gentleman 
at Canton, and superintended the packing of them 
and many other good things for private individuals, 
and for the Royal Gardens at Row, which were to be 
sent home in different vessels, he never could clearly 
find out how many plants ho was instrumental in in¬ 
troducing, as before he reached London Mr. Slater 
