1G2 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
June 2. 
PROLONGING THE BLOOMING OE SALVIA 
GESNERiEFLORA. 
A i'RiKND of mine had more of the Salvia gesnerce- 
Jlora this time last year than he knew what to do with. ! 
After the general stock was kept in flower, from the 
middle of January, in the conservatory, by forcing, and 
to the beginning or middle of June, by retarding some 
of the plants, as Mr. Errington recommends for keeping 
back the more early blossoms, he had them all pruned 
on the close spurring system, leaving a few long shoots 
nearly their full length, and cutting-in every one of the 
side-branches to one or two joints. He rested them 
behind a high wall until they were in leaf, merely 
allowing them as much water as kept them from shrivel¬ 
ling ; he then put in about forty cuttings of them from 
the best top shoots on the “breaks,” as he called it, 
or the young shoots. These cuttings were only three 
joints long, and two of them only could be seen. They 
were planted on a north border, and under an old hand¬ 
glass, and were treated very much like the way Mr. 
Fish does the Calceolaria cuttings. This was shortly 
after the enormous hot days and restless nights we all 
experienced at the beginning of last July, and the 
' whole garden was one hotbed at the time; so that, from 
! the damp of the first good watering, and the confine¬ 
ment of the air under the glass, and over the cuttings, 
I instead of these Salvia cuttings being, as we say, out-of- 
doors, and behind a north wall, they were in reality in 
the climate of Calcutta. They were soon rooted, and 
had three shifts before the end of October, and were 
among the second forced plants for the rooms by the 
end of February. 
It is with the old plants, however, that I have to do, 
and they were planted out in a very exposed part of the 
kitchen-garden slips, without disturbing the balls, or 
receiving more stimulus than common watering until 
they took to the soil, when they were allowed to shift 
! for themselves till the end of September. They were 
then potted in very small pots indeed according to the 
large size of the plants. There was littlo else but the 
old ball left, and all the new roots hanging out from it 
like a hair broom. The whole were then under potted, 
and, from the mildness and dampness of last autumn, 
the plants were left out-of-doors till near Christmas; 
but, from the cramping at the roots, they could not go 
without water more than one or two days all the time, 
and there was no difficulty about getting them forward 
into flower-bud, with a little forcing, among common 
plants and Roses, and as soon as the blossom-heads 
could be seen, the plants were liberally potted in strong, 
rich soil, and weak liquid-manure water from a stagnant 
pond was given them every time they wanted water, 
from that day to this, and nothing that I ever heard of 
paid better. 
1 have been running away from my own story all the 
time, and how 1 must turn back to last July, when some 
of these cut-down Salvias broke wretchedly badly, and 
the gardener ordered one of the men to throw them 
away. He desired his helping-man to get red of them, 
and the help told the boy to do it! When too many 
fingers arc in the pie, w r e soon know the rest; and we 
may as well know that none of these cast-off Salvias 
were ever thrown away, but some of them did actually 
starve by inches, for want of water, last August. Some 
rooted-out through the pots on to the hard gravel, and 
fared a littlo better, and some were watered in a mistake, 
all the time, by the truant boy, to whom the fault of 
their being in existence was traced at the end of the 
season, when the pots were wanted for the bedding- 
plaiits. When the rest of the plants had to be housed 
for the winter, these stinted Salvias were placed in sand 
under the stage of an old-fashioned greenhouse, and the 
little boy, or the young Linnaeus, as they call him now, 
saw that they wanted for nothing all through the winter. 
Before the end of April they were nearly in flower, and 
were planted out-of-doors, where they have flowered 
very satisfactorily all through the month of May, and 
promise to keep on for. the best half of Juno, and 
although they are not in a regular bed, the story is told 
with a view to the successful use of this plant in two 
forms as a bedding-plant, to help us out at the end of 1 
the spring; first, as spare old plants come in, as in the | 
above case, but with a more kind treatment throughout; 
and, secondly, from cuttings put in early in July. 
The gardener, under whom all this originated, thinks 
that if the cuttings arc made from pieces of the old tops ! 
when the plants are pruned in June, that the plants 
will neither flower so soon, nor so early, as when the 
cuttings are taken from the young wood made after the 
pruning. Now, this is just the very opposite of what I - 
would guess, and what his own explanation of the prin¬ 
ciple involved would lead me to believe, but he is more 
practical than I am, or at least, he does not care so 
much about causes; if he gets a good effect Irom a 
mixture of causes, as he says, he is perfectly content. 
One thing is certain, that old plants of this Salvia may 
be kept on short commons all through the summer; 
that the end of a turf-pit, in a dry situation, would keep 
them through an ordinary winter, and that the\ will 
flow r er out-of doors all through the month of May, and 
help to make a good variety when flowers are scaice in 
the beds and borders. 
EARLY-BEDDED CINERARIAS. 
I saw another practice lately, with which I was very 
much pleased. A bed of mixed Cinerarias, in full bloom, 
on the lawn opposite the drawing-room windows, and 
they looked as gay and flourishing as any thing could 
be by the beginning of May, and no doubt they will 
last all through the month, and so give more time for 
the plants in pots that arc to occupy the bed through 
the summer. There is a light iron frame to place over 
this bed of Cinerarias every night, on which some clean 
canvass is stretched over, and nothing can answer better, 
except protecting the blossoms of wall fruit, ol which 
the very best specimen 1 ever saw is in this very garden, 
and about which I must procure a drawing and des¬ 
cription some day. 
1 have used canvass and calico covering for choice 
beds in May for a long time, but in the autumn, 
covering up the flower-beds at night has been a regular 
and expensive work for nearly twenty years at Shrub- 
land Park. I am, therefore, glad to see and heai any of 
these plans for prolonging the enjoyment of flowers 
out-of-doors, being in operation and thought w r eli of. 
The 13ng prevalence of easterly winds, and the late¬ 
ness of this season, kept the earth so much colder than 
it usually is at bedding-out time, that all kinds of 
schemes must be had recourse to before we can expect 
to see the beds in a flourishing state. Watering the j 
beds with soft pond water, from shallow ponds, it- one of 
the best means of warming the earth, because tint kind 
of water is always warmer than hard water, when the 
sun is powerful, and no strong water should ever be 
given to bedding plants till they take a firm hold of the 
soil. 
STANDARD COTONEASTERS. 
I saw another thing in this same garden which 
pleased me very much, and which ought to be well- 
known, but of which very few of us ever heard before; 
a plan by which standards of the Cotoneaster viicro- 
phylla may be had as healthy as standard weeping 
Soplioras or Ash, for when this Cotoneaster is worked 
standard high, it always forms a weeping plant. They 
first began with it grafted on the common Thorn lor a 
stock, but in a few years the two refused to agree well 
