6 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
Aputl 7 . 
Hjemanthus coauctatus. —This also belongs to the 
coccineus section. It has the spathe or envelope valves 
very upright, and close to the flowers. The colour of 
them is a duller red than the last, and the edges of 
the leaves, when they first issue from the bulb, are scar¬ 
let, but they soon turn green when they advance and 
get more in the sun and air. 
ILemanthus incarnatus, zebrinus, concolor, crassipes, 
and tigrinus, are the next best, and their bulbs and 
growth are not so large as in the others, yet with quite 
as large llower-heads; but a description of them would 
only be a repetition in a popular way. Masson, Rur- 
cliell, and Jacquin, are the best authorities for them. 
In this country, where they were at first so much mis¬ 
understood, very few know anything about them, and 
their flowers have not been figured with us, so as to 
give any one an idea of what they are like. Rut they 
will certainly become popular, as w r ell as other tribes of 
bulbs, when it is discovered how cheaply they can be 
grown, and in what small space. All this, however, is 
in reserve for amateurs; for as gardeners are now situ¬ 
ated, there is not one of them out of a thousand who 
can devote the necessary time and attention to the cul¬ 
tivation of any bulbs but the very commonest. 
HAYLOCKIA. 
Hayj.ockia pusilla. —A very small black bulb, with 
very narrow leaves, and flowering from among them, 
exactly like a Crocus; the flowers white, and tending 
to straw colour. Anderson sent home this little curiosity 
from Ruenos Ayres. Another traveller says, it is very 
common at Maldonado, and there is a variety of it with 
red llowers. It grows all the winter, goes to rest before 
Midsummer, and flowers in the autumn, after resting 
about four months. Any light soil will do for it, and 
cold frame culture along with lxia and such like bulbs. 
It is related to Sternbergia, and was once called Stern- 
bergia Americana. 
HERBERTIA. 
These are small Cypella-like bulbs, which flower in 
summer; pulchella is the best of them, with blueish- 
purple flowers ; and ccerulea is only a variety of it, with 
the flowers most decidedly blue. Like the last genus, 
they do better in pots, in light sandy loam, and cold-pit 
treatment. 
HESPERANTHA. 
These are very delicate little plants from the Cape; 
they are more tuberous than bulbous ; flower always in 
the evening, and through the night, and close up in 
bright sunshine. Radiata is the best of them ; the 
flowers are largo, numerous, and of a beautiful light 
violet colour. Avgusta, or angusti/olia, seems only a 
variety of radiata. Falcata is very sweet in the evening; 
the flowers grayish-white, brown in the buds, and edged 
with yellow. Oinnamomea is so called from the outside 
being of a brown cinnamon colour; the flower is pure 
white when it opens, and is a pretty star-like flower. 
All of them are much more impatient of wet than 
fxias, with which they ought to be grown in peat, under 
a cold frame culture. 
HESPEROSCORDUM. 
Hardy, or all but hardy, gawky-looking things, of no 
great account. They put you in mind of the confused 
mass of mongrels called Alliums, and are only fit for 
! botanic collections. 
HIPPEASTRUM. 
Among the large collection of bulbs by the “ Win¬ 
chester,” referred to in my last, were four bulbs marked 
“from my own garden.” The moment I saw them, I 
protested against their being natives of any part of the 
Cape colony, and as soon as they came into leaf, I was 
sure they were not from any part of the African con¬ 
tinent; but, before they flowered, the gentleman who 
sent them came home, and when he was pushed hard 
into a corner as to where he found those four bulbs, he 
owned he had them from Baron Ludwick’s garden in 
Cape Town. They were natives of South America, and 
two of them wore Hippeasters. H. eguestre, the very 
one on which the genus w T as founded, by Dr. Herbert, 
“ following up the idea of Linnaeus, when he named one 
of the original species eguestre.” 
There are about fifteen very distinct species of this 
genus described from bulbs that lmvo flowered in this 
country; and nearly twenty varieties, some of which 
were first described as true species; but, when they all 
became better known, and received the samo kind of 
treatment for many years, and by different individuals 
at the same time, it was easy enough to classify them 
into what were real species or types, and only well- 
marked varieties. At the present day there is not an¬ 
other group of bulbs, of equal extent, better defined than 
Hippeasters; but they are very much reduced now, and 
two-thirds, at least, of the original kinds are out of 
cultivation. 
Every one of the species and varieties cross with each 
other without a single exception ; and, in following out 
these crosses, gardeners lost sight of some of the original 
kinds altogether, so that the whole race is now confined 
to three types only, as far as my knowledge of our col¬ 
lections extend. The most numerous of these is that 
of Retiadatum, which includes all our best reds and 
scarlets, with very dark or bright green bottoms called 
the eye. The Vittatum section is the next, and in 
this, all our striped flowers, or clear white stripes on a 
light red ground, are classed. This is the oldest of all 
the hybrid kinds, beginning with Johnsonii, in 1810, 
which is a seedlingfrom Reginum or Regium, by the pollen 
of Vittatum. The third section is the breed or Solan- 
drijlorum. The flowers in this section are quite different 
from all the rest, both in shape and colours; they have 
tubes, or a narrow bottom, three or four times longer than 
is usual, and the colours are as varied as the colours in 
the speckled breed of cattle. As Hippeasters are known 
to first-rate gardeners much better than Tulips, and as 
all the first-rate gardeners in the three kingdoms, and in 
the colonics thereto belonging, read The Cottage 
Gakdeneii, “ I expect,” as they say in Suffolk, to get 
my whiskers pulled for this classification of “ our 
Amaryllises.” Rut now that Sweet and Herbert are not 
amongst us, I am quite sure that there is not another 
man living who has raised more hybrids in this genus 
than your old Scotch gardener from Inverness ; and if I 
am wrong in my classification it is an error of judgment, 
and any one who can put mo on a better plan will oblige 
mo, even if he calls me anything but a gardener. 
One of the best stimulants that I can offer for the 
more extended cultivation of these beautiful flowers 
among amateurs is this, that every one of them, without 
a single exception, can be grown to the utmost per¬ 
fection in one kind of soil, and that must be the best 
yellow loam that can be had. About London, this kind 
of loam can be got at Norbiton, near the new Crystal 
Palace, or at Wanstead Common. If the drainage is 
very complete, I never could make out that a turfy or 
lumpy soil had any advantage over that which is fine 
enough to sow small seeds in ; if the loam is very strong 
and inclined to bind hard after watering, it should bo 
reduced with clean sand to the proper texture—leaf 
mould, rotten dung, or peat, I believe to be more i 
injurious than not to any bulb that is to remain from 
year to year in the same pot, as is now the custom with 
almost all bulbs that retain their roots for an indefinite 
period. Pure loam, without any vegetable or animal 
manure, will keep sound and fresh for ten or twelve 
I years in the same pot; and any additional richness 
