February 27. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
411 
without bell-glasses, but they would root sooner if under 
such glasses, or small hand-glasses which would hold 
four or six small cutting pots under them. 
All cuttings must be watered, so as to have the sand 
and soil moist the whole time ; but once in two or three 
days will be often enough, unless the sun is strong, or 
the bed is too hot. I have watered cuttings twice in 
one day, and I have known pots which did not want 
any watering for a whole week. No one can tell how 
often a pot of cuttings should be watered without seeing 
it; and, on the whole, I would prefer a little too much 
than that the cutting should want water for a single 
hour. Very good, free drainage is now so well under¬ 
stood, that there is less risk from too much water, and 
more harm from the want of sufficiency. 
Every word I have written about these Calceolarias 
is applicable to Petunias, except that you can make 
cuttings from the tops of the first cuttings as soon as 
they are rooted, if you are short of stuff for better 
cuttings. All cuttings of Petunias ought to be short, 
and, if possible, be from short-jointed shoots. If the 
tops of the first cuttings of any plant are made again 
into cuttings, the bottoms should not be disturbed till 
they “ break ” again ; that is, till they make fresh shoots. 
Rose, purple, and white are the only distinct colours in 
Petunias. The Skrubland Hose, and Shrubland White, 
or Royal White, as it was called at the Crystal Palace, 
are the best two; the purples are endless, and so are the 
streaked, or fancy shades. Any of them is good if one 
likes it; all depends on individual taste. 
If I was forced, by circumstances, to make a stock of 
Scarlet Geraniums from spring cuttings, I would choose 
the longest cuttings I could find ; ten inches would be 
the shortest; but beggars must not be choosers, nor 
gardeners either, if they are in a fix. Everybody makes 
cuttings of some Scarlet Geranium or another, in the 
spring, but no ono would choose this season for a whole 
supply. Everybody, also, who has a very new Geranium 
will make the most of it in the spring, but is a different 
thing altogether from being compelled to fill so many 
beds from spring propagation. 
Cuttings of Ageratums ought to be made from the 
shortest-jointed wood, and be no longer than a couple 
of inches; they soon get long enough,, and often more 
than enough, and require stopping at every second 
joint they make to the end of April. There is a 
variegated Ageratum now, which makes a nice change; 
in the same way as the variegated Salvia fulgens, and 
both ought to be in every garden, either on the mixed 
or any other plan. Very little heat will force Salvias 
for cuttings, and natural growth is better still. If they 
are to be forced, take the strongest cuttings you can 
find, and let them be four inches long; but one joint 
will root if there is a scarcity. The blue Salvia patens 
will now como from cuttiugs as fast as any plant, but 
after it comes up to bloom it will not pay to try it from 
cuttings. 
The variegated Coronilla glauca is a beautiful edging 
plant, and for a mixed garden; it roots now in about 
three weeks. 
Cineraria amclloides is the easiest plant of all the 
blues to got a stock of, and is fit for anything ; it is the 
very best blue we have for making nosegays, and it is 
seldom one sees a cutting of it fail, so you may fill the 
whole pot with them ; three inches is the proper length 
for them. 
For a mixed flower-bed, and where the soil is a good 
deal worn out, Zauschneria Californica comes in very 
useful, and flowers as tall as the Fuchsias, and much in 
the same way ; on fresh or rich beds it goe3 too much to 
leaf. I have seen it in a strong clay border, last year, 
bloom as freely as Fuchsia glohosa. 
Two years ago, I mentioned a very excellent old, but 
very scarce, Verbena, called Helen, of which a bed was 
made in the garden of W. Byam Martin, Esq., of Bank 
Grove, near Kingston. I used this Verbena, at Shrub- 
land Park, in a wide border in front of the Swiss 
summer-house, which we used for a collection of the 
strongest Verbenas, all mixed together, but I then be¬ 
lieved no one had done so elsewhere. I learned, how¬ 
ever, from the French lady, that this plan has been, and 
is, much approved of in first-rate places, and that the 
best display of Verbenas she had seen in England was 
on that very plan. Recollect this was not in a bed, but 
on a long border, the longer the better. In my border, 
Helen was my favourite plant—a rich mulberry colour, 
and a strong, upright grower. At Bank Grove, it was 
ono of the richest beds I have seen, but I am afraid it 
is scarce in the trade. Fragrans was the name of the 
next best of my mixed Verbenas. This is an old blush 
kind, and the sweetest of the race, except Teuorioides. 
Lady Holland is a very strong, light Verbena; it was 
new last year, but I had seen a bed of it the autumn 
before. I believe Hamlet is the best, or one of the best 
of the grey Verbenas to mix with Heliotropes, instead 
of the Duchess d’ Amaule. Cleopatra is an excellent 
crimson Verbena for one bed, or a mixed bed. Defiance 
is still the best and strongest of the creeping scarlets, 
and, perhaps, the best scarlet Verbena we have for 
people of limited means. Edward’s Wonderful is by 
far the most unique and novel of all the Verbenas for 
a bed. I think Mr. Turner, of Slough, is yet the only 
one who has it; he had it last summer at Chiswick, and 
at the Regent’s Park Shows. It is a purplish-blue, with 
a large white eye. I only saw it in a pot, but Mr. 
Turner told me be had a bed of it, or had seen one, the 
best of the kind he ever saw, and I have not the smallest 
doubt about his eye. The King of Purples ought to 
make me his Prime Minister, for my oft mention of 
him as the best purple Verbena for a bed; but here I am 
only speaking of the most particular kinds, and could 
not pass this one. Some like one kind, and some 
another; the soil and situation make a great difference 
in Verbenas; so much so, indeed, that I would not bind 
myself to my own selection in more than one garden. 
The very best and cheapest way to get good, healthy 
Verbenas, is to lay small pots under the runners early 
iu September, to leave them so till near the end of 
October, then to take thirty-two sized pots, and to put 
four plants out of the small pots into one thirty-two, 
and to tie up the shoots to a stick in the centre, these 
will hardly stop growing all the winter, at least, they 
will come out in the spring as thrifty as if the runners 
were still on the old plants, under cover. A few of such 
pots would be sufficient for any one; that is, a few pots 
of each kind ; they yield strong, healthy cuttings, which 
I root in a fow days. All cuttings of Verbenas ought to 
I be short, not more than two inches long. The same 
j light, sandy soil, with a little of the clean sand on the 
, top, will do as well for every kind of cutting for the 
flower-garden as the most delicate mixture one could 
think of. 
Every plant for the flower-garden will root from this 
1 time to the end of April sooner than at any other time ; 
and if old plants are stumpy and short of young shoots 
j for cuttings, the only way is to give them a little extra 
! heat. 
I shall conclude with a particular advice, which is 
suggested by the letter of a new subscriber, who says, 
that he has two good kitchen-gardeners, but who care 
nothing about flowers; and when ho suggests any im¬ 
provements about flower-beds and all that sort of thing, 
they tell him “ it cannot be done,” on some pretext, or 
another. This year ho has determined on “doing” all 
the flowers himself, with the help of a boy; and my 
advice is this, that he had much hotter go to Sebastopol; 
he may do some good there, but he will never accom¬ 
plish what he proposes. Adam was the first gardener; 
