THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
77 
I November 8. 
I after growth is fairly begun, to have the roots well cut 
in, to use very rich soil, and pots as small as the roots 
will go into, strong bottom-heat in a frame, three shifts 
| before the end of July, and to he kept at it as closely 
I and as fast as they can go, or be pushed on to the end 
| of August; then a halt on short commons for six weeks; 
| after that, the very finest spikes of flowers will soon 
! come, which cannot be surpassed by any other mode of 
| culture. The old Justicia coccinea, under this treatment, 
i and not more than two years old, nor allowed much pot 
! room, gives the brightest flower of all the Acanthads in 
the winter and early spring. The great secret with 
plants of the whole order, which flower on the wood 
made the same season, is to give them a very large rest 
after flowering, and to grow them very quick when once 
they are set in motion. 
Dichorisandra thyrsijlora, the old variety, was also 
there, and from the Society’s garden, I believe. This, 
also, is a very useful plant to come into the warm con¬ 
servatory at this season, where it lasts a long while in 
bloom, and after blooming it may rest till May. Many 
years since, we used to set all these kinds of plants to 
grow by the end of February, when they would grow 
long and lanky, and the flowers would not be half so 
good or so numerous. There is a far better variety 1 
than this thyrsijlora, with the flowers more purplish or 
dark blue. I saw it in bloom this time last year, in the 
large conservatory at Kew; and I was told that Sir W. 
Hooker could not see any botanical difference between 
it and the old one to justify a new name; but it should 
be enquired after in the nurseries, for it is . a downright 
good flower. 
There were cut branches of the Oestrum aurantiacum, 
from the conservatory of the Society—a plant that is 
almost always in flower; and we were told that some 
one out in Spain, or somewhere that way, to whom the 
Society gave it some years ago, reports that it is quite 
hardy there, and is in blossom all the year round. I 
wish I had known that ten days sooner, and off it 
should have gone to New Zealand. As it is, what a 
nice tree to shade the Arcadian shepherds in place of 
Virgil’s Fagi, whether these were Beeches or Chesnuts. 
It comes from cuttings as freely as Willows, and, like 
them, nine-inch cuttings of three or four years old 
might be packed in an old boot, and sent to Melbourne 
by the next steamer, and nine out of ten of them would 
grow if they were put six inches deep in the ground, 
and the earth pressed hard to them. 
New Plants. —There was one new plant here to-day, 
that I am quite sure will have as extensive a sale, 
and as wide circulation, as Robinson’s Defiance Verbena. 
Everybody must have it—it is the drollest thing I 
ever saw, to begin with. There is not another flower 
on earth like it, I should think; and it is one of 
the very prettiest plants that a lady could place on 
her work-table to the bargain. The plant was not ! 
more than six or eight inches high, nor much above 
a foot in diameter, and yet it had on one hundred 
flowers; and such flowers! Bright red bladders dan¬ 
gling from slender footstalks, with a nipple-like ending 
at the bottom; the size as big as one of the large Cal¬ 
ceolarias, with a small yellow hood (the real flower) on 
the top, opening in the front, where you could blow the 
! bladder till it burst. There is not a botanist on earth 
j who could give a more natural definition of it; and I 
! had to borrow a flower, which is now in my left hand 
j while the pen is scratching over this account of it. The 
plant is from the high parts of the Neilghery range in 
! India, and will be half-hardy hero It will come easily 
I from cuttings, and I think it will seed. Last of all, it 
is one of the Indian Balsams, and called Impatiens 
| Jerdonice, after Mrs. Dr. Jerdon, by Dr. Wight. It 
was figured lately in the Botanical Magazine , but from 
a very"bad specimen, as the figure gives no idea of the 
beauty of the flower. The red of the flower is of the 
same tint as that in the flower of Dielytra spectabilis. 
The plant is evidently an Alpine plant on the range, 
the stems being old-fashioned, woody-looking things; 
“ short and stubby,” as some of our friends would say. 
The leaves are small, healthy-looking, and without any 
coarseness, as is often the case in this tribe. Last of 
all, Mr. Yeitch, of the Exotic Nursery, Chelsea, was the 
lucky exhibitor of it. I saw it also with Mr. Jackson ; 
and it is at Kew; but we shall have it out by-and-bv. 
The Fuchsia spectabilis was not more earnestly recom¬ 
mended, on its first appearance, by any one than by 
The Cottage Gardener ; but a most beautiful cross 
from it by the pollen of Fuchsia serratifolia was better 
explained and put forth, on this occasion, in the lecture, 
than I can pretend to do. Nevertheless, I shall have a 
try at it; for there is nothing I like better than to have 
a real good new plant, to pull out its character and 
history. This is a new cross—I mean new as between 
two distinct natural species—which, after all, I really 
believe to be the only and the best mode of getting new 
Fuchsias to satisfy our taste for novelty. After fifteen 
years at crossing varieties of Fuchsias by the thou¬ 
sand, what have we got? Just four good plants, and 
hardly that—a white, and the other three are so 
many modifications of the old coccinea, or of gracilis, 
and globosa. I say, looking at all this, and seeing that 
serratifolia, cordifolia, and spectabilis, are capable of 
giving us a new race of Fuchsias that will flower all 
the winter, and on through the spring, until the old 
ones come in in May, I am now more confirmed than 
ever that the species must be worked, or crossed, toge¬ 
ther, in preference to the varieties of garden seedlings. 
Last winter, I knew a large, straggling plant of Fuchsia 
cordifolia that flowered as well as any Fuchsia I ever 
saw till the end of March; from this time, and during 
the preceding summer, it was so neglected, in the back 
regions, that it was leafless, and supposed dead for four 
months ; and it was only on observing flower-buds 
coming on the leafless branches, in October, that the 
plant was watered, and taken in-doors, where it did so 
well that I then suggested a cross from it by serratifolia, 
little knowing at the time that a cross for winter 
flowering from a better plant, spectabilis, was in ex¬ 
istence ; but so it was, and we had a plant of it at this 
meeting nearly four feet high, and a yard right through 
it, composed of so many shoots from near the surface of 
the pot, and every branch promising to go on flowering 
till late in the spring. I took it to be an entire new 
species the moment I saw it—an improvement on specta- 
bilis, but of that strain; and the young wood, the underside 
of its large leaves, are of deep red or blood-colour, as in 
spectabilis. The upper surface of the leaves is of the most 
peculiar tint—a greenish-purple, or, as you sometimes 
see the leaves on the shaded side of a purple Beech, and 
they are of the most healthy looks. The flowers are 
somewhat larger and more stout than those of specta¬ 
bilis ; but let us say fully as good as those of spectabilis ; 
and, as that has caused a great disappointment, owing 
to the difficulty of growing it healthy, this is just a 
proper substitute for it. It was sent by Mr. Veitcli, 
with the Indian Balsam, and he named it Dominiana, 
after Mr. Dominy, the plant foreman in his establish¬ 
ment for the last twenty years, who was brought up, and 
“brought out,” in this very establishment; and who, 
after the hundreds of good new plants that must have 
passed under his hands, allowed this new one to be 
called after himself. He must have had a great deal ol 
confidence in its merits, from the very first seed-leat; and 
he is not disappointed. 
Messrs. Standish and Noble sent a new shrubby 
Calceolaria, called hyssopifoUa, which promises to bo 
very useful for bedding and for crossing. The habit is 
of the best stamp for a bed, being a close grower, small, 
