100 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
December 1. 
OTHER ZEPHYRANTHS. 
There are several more species of this genus known 
to, and described by, botanists and travellers, but they 
are either not in cultivation, or little known if they are. 
The whole race delight in light, rich, sandy loam ; and 
if they are grown in pots, large upright 32’s are the 
best for them, and from three to seven bulbs might be 
put in each pot, and no peat or leaf-mould should be 
used in the compost. In the East Indies, and in Aus¬ 
tralia, all of them would answer for Crocuses. Candida, 
carinata, rosea, and the varieties of verecunda, are the 
best as a selection of them. D. Beaton. 
VAGARIA. 
This (omitted in its proper place) is the only genus 
in the whole series with which I found myself at fault; 
and in returning thank'3 to two or three individuals who 
assisted me out of a fix, here and there, with some 
obscure species, I must add, that I could not find a 
gardener, or amateur, who could define Vagaria, or 
even conjecture which is Vagaria proper. What I 
always took for Vagaria is the Spanish bulb called 
Lapiendra, with the white band in the leaf, and I made 
some enquiries about it in The Cottage Gardener 
some time siuce. I once thought I had it by the ear 
through a gentleman well known as Dodman; but, no; 
not yet. 1 knew that Dr. Herbert cancelled his Vagaria 
long since, on receiving what he took to be its type, 
Pancratium parvijiorum, from the Garden of Plants in 
Paris. I knew, also, that Dr. Lindley re-opened the 
genus Vagaria on receiving the true Pancratium parvi¬ 
jiorum, of Redoute’s Liliacees. Here was a fix; and to 
one who knows the botheration caused by “ Answers to 
Correspondents,” to those whose time is of the utmost 
value, it was hard to trouble the author of the second 
Vagaria; but a less authority could not uufix me; and 
now I have to thank Dr. Lindley for putting me on the 
right scent. “ I regard it as perfectly certain,” he re¬ 
plies, “that my Vagaria and Redoute’s Pancratium 
parvijiorum (as to the flowers) are identical: but his 
leaves are evidently represented from some other plant, 
as so often happens when flowers and leaves are not 
co-extaneous,” or produced together. “ Lapiendra is, no 
doubt, a very different thing.” 
VAGARIA PARVIFLORA 
Is now ascertained, beyond a doubt, to be a native of 
South America, having been recently introduced from 
Bogota by C. B. Warner, Esq. The leaves are broad 
above, aud narrow, or petiolated, at bottom, like those 
of Griffinia; but the nearest affinity is to Euryclcs. 
“ Certainly it is no Pancratium .” “ The flowers are 
small, firm, white, with a greenish tube,” and five of 
them form the umbel. It is a greenhouse bulb, aud 
does best in sandy loam and a little rotten dung. 
D. B. 
SEASONABLE LITTLE MATTERS. 
Since writing last week, what changes we have had! 
a sharpish frost at one time, an April day at another. 
The beauty of the flower-garden is now over for this 
season, though, six days ago, on the 10th instnnt, 
Dahlias, Ageratums, Penstemons, Calceolarias, Cup hens, 
Fuchsias, &c., were very beautiful. A few days pre¬ 
viously, and even the Heliotrope was more sweet and 
beautiful than in June. The flowers of all, except, 
perhaps, the Penstemons , are now injured, although the 
foliage of many, as Scarlet Geraniums, shrubby Calceo¬ 
larias, «Scc., are little the worse for the changes of weather 
they have passed through. Had it not been for the wet 
dull weather preceding filling the young shoots with 
watery fluid, the frost would have exercised less injury 
than it has. Like our correspondents, who are now 
eagerly inquiring what they are to do with their plants, 
we should feel, that if such matters had not received 
previous attention, we should be alluding to them now 
even past the eleventh hour. And yet, for the sake of 
beginners, who are really Cottage Gardeners, I am tempted 
to advert to a few little matters that are all-important 
to them. 
SCARLET GERANIUMS. 
This red blazer is still an universal favourite. For the 
florists’ Pelargoniums for windows, a fair friend told me, 
she had found such benefit from the details of Aunt 
Harriet’s system, that she troubled herself but little 
about other articles. It always gives me a spice of 
pleasure to find that some one else has been more 
succesful in popularising the minutiae of plant culture 
than I have been able to be. I have found that the 
description, by the same writer, of “ Harry More’s ” 
system of managing Scarlet Geraniums in pots or boxes 
—keeping the plants in the same boxes for years, and 
removing them to any dry place secure from frost before 
they were injured—is the best for securing abundaut 
bloom in windows and balconies. If the soil is pretty 
moist at storing-away time, and if then the pots or 
boxes are covered with moss or dry hay, aud a little 
of the latter is left ready to throw over the tops in a 
very frosty time, little more will be required until 
March, when any shrivelled shoots may be removed, 
the plants be placed nearer light, and have their stems 
syringed or sponged with milk-warm water. In April, 
a little surface-soil may be scraped off, the soil moved 
with a pointed stick to allow air to enter, then watered, 
pruned a little where necessary, and surfaced with fresh, 
rather rich soil, and the same plants will bloom 
better and better every year. I have found no plan 
more certain aud economical than this. 
But some of our friends, who ask questions how they 
are to manage these plants, in damp cellars and dry 
cellars, in close garrets and dry garrets, say, and with 
truth, that this is no direct answer to them, when their 
plants are not now in boxes, but have been growing in 
the open ground. Well, even here, those possessing no 
glass will find it best to imitate, as far as possible, the 
Harry More system. I have hung plants up in damp 
cellars, and they moulded and rotted. I have hung 
them up in dry cellars and garrets, and they became 
mummy-dried. I have packed the roots in damp moss, 
and left the tops exposed, unless in severe frost, and 
had few failures. I have taken them up in barrowfuls 
to the rubbish heap—there cut off all the soft part of 
the green shoots, and every leaf; shortened the long 
roots to some six iuches in length; dipped the tops, and 
especially the cut parts, in a pot of quick-lime; arid 
then packed the roots, as close as the stems would 
squeeze together, in wooden boxes, and in soil slightly 
moist, the latter being placed rather firm; and then 
taken these boxes to any out-of-the-way place, rather dry, 
aud where there could be a little light admitted on fine 
days, and covering thrown over all when the weather 
was severe. In such boxes we used to have some fail¬ 
ures, but, on the whole, the system answered well. 
Those who had convenience might pot them separately, 
in April, and coax them forward in their windows ; and 
those who had not that convenience would have to thin 
them out as soon as the tops became a thicket—placing 
some under a temporary protection, and others in beds, 
to be protected there. The minutiae here are every¬ 
thing. The removing of the green parts and leaves 
lessens the evaporating surface, and takes away the 
parts likely to damp or shrivel; this damping and bleed¬ 
ing are farther prevented by the action of the quick¬ 
lime. The older parts of the stem contain a storehouse 
of organisable matter, which only require the stimuli of 
