THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
December 27 
16 (» 
allowed to form. The Cypress and the Deodar cedar 
from India, as well as some other trees, grow with 
their leading shoots hanging down on one side, and 
many persons think this a natural defect, and so 
will have them tied up to sticks, thinking they are 
assisting nature, when they are just doing the reverse, 
or, at any rate, have their labour in vain, for such 
trees never fail to right themselves, and take the up¬ 
right position as they become ripe and hard. 
Silver Cedar.— Speaking of cedars, reminds me 
of some information I received this last autumn 
about cedars from a courier, a native of Athens, who 
was in the suite of a nobleman who was here on a 
visit. He was a most intelligent traveller, and had 
a natural turn for scientific pursuits; he had been 
up several times into Nubia, past the cataracts on 
the Nile, and through the different routes from Cairo 
through the Arabian Desert into Palestine; he ga¬ 
thered cones at four different times of the ancient 
cedars on Mount Lebanon, one of which, a very 
small specimen, I obtained from him. Jn 1814 he 
was in Algiers, and mixed with the French military 
in one of those dreadful campaigns against the Arabs; 
and at a place five days’ journey inland from Algiers 
the French routed a large camp of Arabs, and took 
their cattle and sheep, of which they stood much in 
need for rations, but there was not a bush or tree 
within miles of them to make fires to cook their spoil 
with ; so they broke down the poles and sticks of the 
Arabs’ tents, and he says the whole air was perfumed 
by the burning of these dry poles, which were made 
from the wood of the white cedar peculiar to the 
Atlas range, and as there have been some doubts 
raised in England lately about this cedar being dif¬ 
ferent from the old cedar of Lebanon, I particularly 
inquired of him whether this was really correct or 
not. Fie made no hesitation in pronouncing the two 
cedars to be quite different. He visited a large forest 
of the white cedar growing on a lateral branch of low 
hills, which spread southward from the main chain 
of the Atlas, and about half way between Algiers and 
the Atlantic : and besides the silvery appearance of 
the under side of the leaves, he said that on all the 
trees rows of teeth passed along the upper side of the 
branches, standing erect like the teeth of a rake, and 
giving the whole head a very peculiar appearance. 
This part of his description I could not understand 
until I received one of the so-called teeth from him, 
which turns out to be the axis, or central part, of one 
of the cones; but whether the cones drop from the 
silver cedar in detached scales, as in the Balm of 
Gilead fir, or the whole cone at once, I could not 
make out. He found no cones under the trees, al¬ 
though he looked diligently for them, and the trees 
were so large and so difficult to climb, that he had 
to shoot off some cones with his gun. Seeds from 
these cones have vegetated in England, and the 
plants are now from a foot to 18 inches high—that 
is, in four seasons’ growth. The nobleman in whose 
garden the plants have been reared, has since corro¬ 
borated all these particulars, for he, too, saw the 
forest of white cedars on the Atlas, and also those on 
the Lebanon, and he adds, “ when the wind moves 
the branches of the silver cedar, the silvery hue from 
the underside of the leaves is very conspicuous at a 
long distance.” Now, if this should turn out to be 
only a well marked variety of the old cedar of Leba¬ 
non, it is very well worth inquiring after, and our 
nurserymen, who have connections in Paris, would no 
doubt hear more about it there ; for I am told that 
a large quantity of seeds of it have been sent to 
France from Algiers, and I think there need be little 
[ fear in buying the plants as new and very distinct; 
[ indeed, the Horticultural Society have already distri- 
j buted some plants of it under the name of Silver 
; cedar . D. Beaton. 
GREENHOUSE AND WINDOW 
GARDENING. 
Raising Plants from Seed. —A correspondent 
i residing in a retired part of the country, signing 
! himself Tyro, states that, owing to the distance from 
! a nurseryman, and the expense of carriage, it is im- 
| possible for him to obtain plants unless he raises them 
from seed, and wishes for a list of the hardy green¬ 
house plants and half-hardy plants that may be thus 
propagated, and then grown upon a stage under a 
veranda facing the south, with the advantage of a 
pit to winter them in. As our good Editor thinks 
that a short list would be generally useful, and our 
correspondent is in a great haste about the matter, 
we prefer adverting to it here, rather than in the 
column to correspondents, merely premising that 
those named are some of those we have observed 
seeding most freely in this country. Nice little plants 
of the most of them could be forwarded by post from 
the nurserymen ; and thus several months, if not a 
whole season, would be gained at no great additional 
cost; but we know that many people, even in affluent 
circumstances, feel a peculiar pleasure in those plants 
that from first to last have been reared and attended 
to by themselves. The most of the following may 
j generally be obtained from seedsmen :— 
1. Shrubs : Acacia. —All the dwarfer kinds of this 
| genus would be suitable for such a position and 
mode of culture, and some of the larger-growing 
ones, such as Lophantha, might be grown for the 
back of the stage, as the pinnated leaves are very 
pretty. Most of the family are chiefly distinguished 
for the clustered whorls of yellow male flowers— 
some plants possessing both the sexes; and others, 
again, being either wholly male or wholly female. 
Soil: peat and loam, increasing the loam as the plant 
gets older. 
Coronilla —comparatively hardy ; the greenhouse 
and frame species being natives of the south of 
Europe. Soil: similar to the above. 
Cytisus. —All the greenhouse species, as well as 
Genista cananensis, have yellow flowers like the 
above, but mostly borne upon spikes. The foliage 
and habits of the plants are more elegant. The seeds 
will be all the better for being steeped a day in warm 
water before sowing them. Soil: peat and loam, in¬ 
creasing the latter as the plants get older. 
Clianthus puniceus should be sown and grown in 
peat and loam, adding a little dung and some lumps 
of charcoal as the plant gets older. After the first 
or second season the plants should be forced along 
upon the one-shift system, otherwise the bunches of 
flowers will be apt to be small, and the leaves subject 
to red spider. 
Chouozema.—A ll the species of this family are 
beautiful, some pre-eminently so—flowers, reddish 
and yellowish. Plants from seed are generally su¬ 
perior to those from cuttings. Soil: sandy, turfy 
1 peat, with a little turfy loam and charcoal for the 
more vigorous kinds, as the plants get well estab- 
| fished. 
Go.mphoi.obiums. —Natives of new Holland; flowers 
something similar to the above, mostly yellow. Soil. 
fibry sandy peat, with pieces of charcoal. Plants 
| very impatient of too much moisture, or of a clogged 
1 sour soil; drainage and watering must therefore be 
