104 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
May 12. 
j published in these pages ; and even if they present nothing 
novel, shall be most willing to communicate the results 
privately to the sender. 
W. B. Tegetmeier, Tottenham, Middlesex. 
VIOLETS FOR WINTER BLOOMING. 
Although such an excellent paper has recently been 
given by that practical and scientific man, Mr. Fish, I beg 
j to offer a few hints upon the method I have practised for 
many successive years. I have cultivated most of the 
varieties of these beautiful little flowers in my time, but 
now 1 content myself with only two of its varieties. Of 
these, 1 think the best is the Double Neapolitan , which is of 
: a beautiful lilac colour, and I would rather look at a two or 
J three-light frame filled with this one kind, than see a mixture 
i of violets there varying in colours, and single and double in 
form. Although, as Mr. Fish .justly says, the Neapolitan 
is too tender to stand out-of-doors during the winter, 
without protection, yet, with protection, it is less liable than 
any other to damp otf during muggy weather in the winter 
months. This kind forms, better than any other, a compact 
evergreen bunch, with its leaves and ilowers; and even its 
stolons, or young shoots, incline upwards from the earth, 
and improve the group. 
The other kind we grow is that called the Tree, or 
Perpetual Violet, but we grow it not as a tree, but treat it 
as we do the other. 
Now of these two kinds, I have as many pots as will fill 
a two-light frame every year, and from them we are able to 
gather flowers, more or less, during all the winter and 
spring months. I have frequently taken two prizes for I 
these same pots of plants at the Winchester Horticultural 
Exhibitions in November and March, which is some proof 
of their well-doing. 
When the flowering season is over, I make up a nice little ; 
bed in a cool part of the garden, towards the end of April, 
but open to light, and not too near walls or the shade of 
trees. The soil is well dug and worked up, and the bed 
marked out, three feet wide, a few crumbs are thrown up 
from the sides, and then I treat it with a barrow-full, or 
more, as the case may require, of well-decayed manure from 
the frame-ground, such as leaf-mould, with a little loam 
mixed with it, or old manure of some kind, such as would 
all pass through a sieve if required. This manure is placed 
over’the surface of the bed, and then the spade again 
goes to work chopping and working it in thoroughly, so that 
no rake is required, and should there be a slug in the soil 
it would have but a poor chance to escape tire many chops 
with the spade. The sides are then marked out, leaving 
the bed four or five inches higher than the path, and the 
bed is ready to receive the plants. Of course my mind is 
made up as to the number of plants I am going to plant 
out, so that the size of the bed is made accordingly. If I 
want fifteen pots of each colour, or kind, to fill my frame, T 
plant that number, allowing about six over. My bed being 
, three feet wide, just holds three plants across it, and the 
I same distance apart in the row, or about nine inches from 
plant to plant, every way. 
The old flowering plants are turned out of their pots; are 
divided into quite single crowns, and every broken, or faulty 
leaf, is removed, and the long and straggling roots cut away, 
t hey are then planted with the dibble , and if on a dry day, 
a little water is given to settle the earth to the roots. If the 
lime-bag is made use of the same evening, for the purpose 
of giving a slight dusting of quick-lime, all the better, for it 
prevents the worms drawing the plants out of their places 
i before they are established ; and should there be a slug on 
1 the prowl, if the lime-dust which reaches him be not strong 
j enough to kill, it causes him to turn back another way. 
' After the plants have been bedded out three or four days, 
look them over, and open the earth carefully right up to the 
plant, and see that every plant is in a fair way of doing well; 
or should any one have failed, make it good immediately. 
Never let the season be lost, because, if you do, you must 
afterward have a patchy bed. 
I Nothing more will be required but frequent earth-stirring 
and keeping all the little side-shoots plucked away; but I 
never remove any of the stronger crown-like runners. 
I allow the plants to increase this way in the bed until 
the first week in September, when I lift them all into pots 
again ; that is, I pot off as many as will fill up my two-light 
frame again. Should a dull afternoon, or wet, misty day, 
happen about this time, I never let it escape, but lift my 
plants immediately, fetching them in from the bed in a 
seive, three or four at a time, to the potting-bench, and as 
the plants are potted they are watered and placed upon 
boards under a north wall for a time, and should the 
weather be dry and hot, as it frequently is at this time, the 
plants are sprinkled over every evening with water. 
If carefully potted they will put out a host of side-shoots, 
which should be plucked away as often as they appear, and 
every decayed leaf removed. Slugs I look after at the time 
of potting most sedulously; yes, and at all other times too. 
I do not know what sort of palates slugs have, but they 
are just as eager to devour a young Tobacco plant, or a 
l’etunia, as a sweet Violet. 
Towards the end of the month of September the pots are 
all brought into their winter quarters, the frame, and placed 
there upon coal-ashes so as to be near the glass. Whilst in 
the frame I give them all the air that can be given them, 
taking even the whole of the pots very often entirely out of 
the frame, and then every part of the place is searched for 
slugs, and the pots too are searched both in taking in and 
out. 
This taking in and out seems to do the plants much good 
besides aiding cleanliness. Decayed leaves are at all times 
looked after and removed. 
There is no place suits the Violet so well as the cold 
frame, but they should be well protected in frosty weather. 
I have, ere now, had them covered up for ten days or a 
fortnight at a time in severe frosty weather. There is 
nothing like being on the right side of a frost. One had 
better cover up a little more than is necessary than not 
enough ; it is only the pleasure of doing it, for “ trouble ’’ is a 
word not in The Cottage Gardeners' Dictionary. 
Two pots of these double, freely-blooming kinds, are 
always more productive than twice the number of either of 
the singles, and any lady esteeming a bouquet will prefer a 
good double flower to a single one. 
The present time is good for planting out Violets. I have 
planted out the first week of this May, and although I have 
mostly been a week earlier, it is all in good time.—T. 
Weaver, Gardener to the Warden of Winchester College. 
POULTRY-YARD REPORT. 
Having observed in The Cottage Gardener that some 
persons would like to see the returns of poultry-yards, and 
having been very particular in collecting all eggs myself, 
and keeping a daily account, I send you the result for the 
last four months, for publication in your valuable work, 
should you think it worth inserting. 
All my fowls are chickens of last year; twelve are Cochin- 
China, the rest are half-bred and common fowls. The 
common fowls did not begin to lay till they were more than 
nine months old, though early hatched; but the others 
commenced before they were six months old, and I have 
many now sitting the second time this year, and two with 
their second broods ; these have, in three weeks after 
hatching, commenced laying again, but do not leave their 
chickens till within a short time of their wanting to sit 
The greater part of these were only nine months old on the 
27 th of April, yet many of them have laid upwards of 100 
eggs this year, and one laid 93 without missing a day. I 
cannot be mistaken, as she laid separately, and a much 
darker egg than the others. 
I consider greaves bad for grown-up fowls, and I should 
say, from the experience I have had, that they ruin the 
fowls in a very short time, besides producing a large number 
of soft eggs. A small quantity of meat is all very well as 
medicine,. and any scraps from your own table given to 
chickens improves them wonderfully. Greaves are good for 
young ducks, but worms are better. 
My food for twenty-nine fowls, five ducks, and twenty 
i 
