Mabch 23. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
479 
ing the times of growth and of rest. The Messrs. Hen- i 
derson sent a good plant of Brachysema acuminata , with 
the flowers all ready to open, when they are of a rich 
crimson-scarlet. This is really a good greenhouse I 
plant, that seems easy to grow and look well; they also 
sent Bilbergia iridifiora, one of those young Pine-apple- 
looking plants which are so conspicuous from the J 
bright scarlet bracts which accompany the flowers; and 
a very healthy youug plant of Franciscea confertifiora, 
in good bloom, together with the Acacia Drummondi, i 
which, I believe, is quite a different thing from the one 
exhibited by Mr. Veitch. Also, a very large plant that 
would come in well to fill up a corner of a room when j 
company, ora ball, or wedding, was expected: this is 
called Conoclinium ianthemum ; it was three feet high, 
and four feet in diameter; the flowers are in large heads 
on the tops of the branches, looking as if they were a i 
cross between the blue Ageratum and a purplish Colts¬ 
foot ( Tussilago ), or bluish, with a tinge of purple ; most 
of the branches were cut-in last year to eighteen inches, 
their bottoms are now quite hard wood, and the new 
top parts are soft-wooded, and looking as if all the 
plant ought to be as soft as they. By a system of, 
] growing this plant as they do young Hydrangeas, for 1 
| one large head to a pot, it can be had in bloom in a 
three-inch pot, and, t believe, a little plant, with a big i 
'■ head in this way, which I saw' on the table, was from 
l the garden of the Society. At any rate, there it was to 
j prove the fact, which is w'ell worth keeping in mind, as 
any flower you can stick in a little vase on the corner of 
the mantelpiece, when friends come in for the evening 
in winter, is as good as a prize plant in May or June. 
For the same reason, people ought now to push on 
duplicate plants of as many of the dwarf Acacias as 
they can get room for; get them through with their , 
flowering as quickly as possible: then prune them in as 
close as a Cabbage Rose; force them to make a quick 
growth, by keeping them close and a little warmer than 
a greenhouse till the middle or end of May ; put them 
out-of-doors after the turn of Midsummer, and in the j 
I full sun, if they can stand it, or as soon as they can ; i 
i not to leave them out too long in September, and they 
will be in bloom for the rooms, or conservatory, early in 
! the new year; and by going through the same process 
in 1855, but two months sooner, they would be ready 
for a gentle forcing early in November, to come in with 
i the first Camellias and Chinese Azaleas, and in the very 
middle of the Chrysanthemums in their season. I never 
j saw this class better done in this style than by my 
successor at Shrubland Park, last autumn, the pots 
standing on a bed of white sand, but not plunged , which 
: was in favour of their ripening so well, and of their 
being so abundantly in bloom-bud. The Azalea squa- j 
mata I mentioned the other day, would freely yield to 
this treatment and make a change of tint among the 
usual flowers which come in before Christmas. 
It is a great misfortune that most of the old Acacias 
from the Cape get so soon to be such trees and bushes 
that few can find room for them, as they could he 
brought in just the same as the new race from New Hol¬ 
land, and they are more varied in their leaves and style 
; of growth; that is what I was thinkiug of, on seeing 
two very nice plants of the old Acacia longifolia from 
j the collection of the Society. I think they were only in 
No. 24 pots, but they were six or seven feet high, wide 
in proportion, and clothed down to the pot; they were 
also in such profusion of bloom, that if I could but add 
new to them, I would run them up higher than even 
; Drummondi. All we can do with these Cape Acacias 
! is to keep a succession of young plants of them, and 
i cramp them at the roots in small pots, and keep stop- 
! ping them from May to September. When they get 
too big for us, let them be planted out-of-doors in May, 
and take their chance. They often escape in mild 
winters; but, what is better than all, everybody can grow 
them. Among the high nobility, Acacias have become 
very fashionable within the last ten years; but as they 
come in when few people are about visiting large places, 
the great bulk of our plant people think they are too 
common for them to gi'ow; so there is a fashion in 
flowers as in bonnets and dresses. 
A fine, large plant of the now Gytisus ramosus was 
shown by the Society under the first name by which it ( - 
was known, Genista rhodopncea, and their old Trymalium j 
odoratissimum is now, probably, the best plant of it in j 
Europe. It may be about five feet high, trained to a 
circular trellis, and not hard pruned, which is the great 
secret of its health and profuse flowering. Then, how is 
a plant, which grows and flowers exactly like Ceonathus 
azureus, made to bloom without being cut-in very close 
every year after flowering? Just as they manage that 
same Ceanothus at Shrubland Park ; when it reached 
the top of the wall they merely thin out the old branches, 
and train down the young wood over the old parts, cut¬ 
ting off the points, here and there, when they are not 
thoroughly ripened. 
The crimson-flowered Azalea obtusa was in this col¬ 
lection ; also Epacris lineata, a light pink; Epacris ar- 
dentissima, a fine crimson; a very fine hybrid Begonia, 
a seedling from hydrocotylifolia, stronger in all the parts 
than that species; I forget the other parent, but it is not 
manicata, as was first given out. Some one had made 
a mistake in that cross; a large plant of Dielytra spec- 
tabilis, with better coloured flowers than is usually seen 
in forced plants of it; this is now, beyond a doubt, per¬ 
fectly hardy, but no flower suffers so much from the least 
over-heating. Azalea ramentacea, another of Mr. For¬ 
tune’s new China ones, a very dwarf, white-flowering 
kind, with thicker leaves than any of the old breed, and 
in that respect would improve the leaves of any of our 
white seedlings, and would also give them a more com¬ 
pact mode of growth. A magnificent cut plant of 
Acacia lineata, which has a close way of growth, with 
Pultenea retusa, full of pea-flowers, which are mostly 
yellow, and the best varieties of the Chinese Primrose, 
in sections of double flowers, with plain and fringed 
sorts. Also a large plant of the beautiful evergreen, 
hardy Berberis Danvinii, from a cold frame. It was a 
yard high, in a No. lb pot, and very gay it was; and 
last of all, Echeveria obtusa, which deserves to be a 
window plant, and is all but hardy. 
Of Fruits, we had only three fine bunches of the Mus¬ 
cat of Alexandria Grapes, turning into raisins, as they 
mostly do at this late season, but otherwise in good con¬ 
dition for table ; with some pots of Cuthill's Black 
Prince Strawberry, in 48-sized pots, but not done well; 
and Mr. Solomons spoiled a dish of Strawberries, w'hich 
he sent from Covent Garden, by mixing Keen’s Seed¬ 
lings with the Black Prince in the same dish. 
Thomas Good and Co., of South Audley-street, sent 
several rich-looking flower vases for rooms, stair-cases, 
&c., with stands, of different colours, forms, and work¬ 
manship, some of which were highly rich in colours— 
all had a good allowance for drainage. This class of 
vases is used by the great for holding plants in pots, 
which are changed as often as they get out of flower, or 
single specimens in pots. When there are more than i 
one pot, some kind of stand is necessary to get up the j 
rims of the pots to nearly the rims of each vase, and j 
then to cover all the pots with green moss. One great 
error I have seen in this arrangement was to put a 
larger pot inside the vase than could be hid, giving one ; 
the idea that the pot was too big for the size of the vase, 
and if you pushed it farther down you must split the 
vase to pieces. 
Of the most profitable timber, and of fancy timber, 
there were lots this time; and the subject seems to take 
uncommonly well among the lords of the soil, hut ladies | 
