442 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
September 8. 
* 
seuxias, Sisyrinchiums, and Maricas, are among the most 
difficult bulbs in the world to classify. Many of them 
have their flowers come and go in a day ; so that, 
although some of them are exquisitely marked in the 
flowers, they have never gained much ground in culti¬ 
vation. It is not at all improbable but some of them 
from all the four families would unite by the pollen; and 
if so, they would outdo the bulbous Irises, and look 
much in the same way. I never found peat to agree 
with any of this race. 
ALBUCA AND ORNITHOGALUM. 
Some of these often come over from the Cape, but 
there is not the least reliance to be placed on the names. 
They flower like wild Hyacinths, and chiefly have white 
flowers. I once had a large yellow-flowering Ornitho- 
galum from the Cape, but 1 never heard the right name 
of it. The bulbs are tender-skinned, aud want plenty 
of sand put in round them, and they dislike peat. 
LACHENALIA. 
There are but very few good kinds come over of this 
genus, but at the Cape some of them are said to look 
very fine indeed. The only two of them that can be 
obtained in the trade, I believe, are the old L. tricolor, 
and a new one called aurea. Both are very good plants. 
The latter was boughtlately by the Horticultural Society 
from an African traveller, who brought over several 
curiosities, among which was said to be the Yellow Gera¬ 
nium ; but the “ Golden Yellow Geranium,” mentioned 
by Sweet, is yet to come. 
Of all the bulbs in Africa, these Lachenalias are the 
worst to keep, the skin of the bulbs being so thin and 
tender. They ought to nestle in pure white sand, and 
the rest to be of pure sandy loam, which keeps them 
longer than peat. Tricolor is as hardy as a Crocus in 
constitution, and will do in any peat or loam for years. 
Flava, purpurea, pendula major , and minor, angustifolia, 
and orchioides, I have seen, more than once, come home 
in a general collection of Cape bulbs; and I expect 
Jlava is the same as the Society’s aurea. Six or seven 
of their bulbs could be grown in a 48-sized pot, under 
the same treatment as Ixias. 
TRITONIA. 
At page 399, I see I missed Tritonia aurea, the 
newest and best of the whole family, and now a general 
favourite in all the Nurseries. The flower scape is 
branched, or panicled, and produces abundance of large 
golden-yellow or yolk-of-egg-coloured flowers. In pots 
it is often half murdered. It would require such a bed 
as the Ghent Alstromerias out-of-doors, and it would 
follow them in flowering through July and August. 
There are several odds and ends of Cape bulbs yet to 
mention; but these, and what are given at page 398, 
comprise the great bulk of the small Cape bulbs. The 
large sorts have been treated of in the order of the 
alphabet, except Nerine, and a few more, which must 
now stand over for their turn in the alphabetical 
arrangement. 
As a general rule, all bulbs from the Cape that are 
j bigger than a pullet’s egg should each have a pot for 
itself, and that only large enough to leave half-an-inch 
or so between the bulb and the side of the pot. The 
first year, one-half of each of such bulbs may safely be 
left out of the soil; but after that, unless it were in the 
hands of good gardeners, or practical amateurs, I think 
all bulbs are safer to be just covered up to the neck with 
the soil. All these large bulbs ought to have good 
friable loam, and no peat or leaf mould, nor, indeed, any 
mixture whatever. The surface soil from an old onion 
bed in the kitchen garden, is far safer and better for 
them than the best compost one could make. 1 have 
stated the soil for the small bulbs; and I repeat, that a 
great error was committed in treating them all, in former 
days, in peat, like Ixias. 
People going to reside at the Cape, or in any part of 
the colony, and who are fond of gardening, should take 
with them as many of the Mexican or South American 
half-hardy bulbs as they can procure—for bulbs will 
carry from place to place like potatoes or onions, and 
w r ould be safe if planted at once in the open soil. All those 
who have friends out there, and of whom they would ask 
bulbs, ought to point to the north-west of the country 
between Cape Town and the mouth of the Orange River. 
The whole of that country is all but unexplored, as far 
as this generation is concerned. There is one bnlb 
somewhere in that country worth anything to a cross¬ 
breeder at Sidney—I mean the Amaryllis marginata of 
Jacquin; or Nerine marginata, as it is supposed to be 
by modern botanists. This is known from all other 
bulbs by a red margin to the leaves. Erom the south¬ 
east, along the banks of the Delagoa River, we once had 
a Grinum, with from thirty to forty flowers on a scape, 
of most beautiful purple. This is lost, and is now very 
much wanted to increase the beauty of our half-hardy 
Grinums. 
The Golden Yellow Geranium we want, too, as bad as 
anything, but not the pale straw-coloured, gaping weeds 
which are not worth cultivating. 1). Beaton. 
SEASONABLE NOTES. 
Making Cuttings of Pelargoniums. —“ I have just 
cut down my plants, after the stems have been well 
hardened by standing in the sun; and two correspond¬ 
ents, who know all this, have sent requesting some 
cuttings; but what puzzles me,-even though it makes 
it more easy to suit them both, is, that one wishes to 
have nice vigorous pieces, with the leaves fresh and 
green, from the points of the cut shoots; and the other 
wishes the fine hard pieces from which the leaves have 
fallen. Now, will you tell me which of my friends has 
most science and practical utility on his side, as then I 
may learn something as to what method I should adopt 
in future?” This is one of those questions on which 
much may be said on both sides. Where conveniences 
exist for preventing rapid evaporation from the cutting, 
and quick rooting is an object, then the first-mentioned 
mode would be the best; but where the cuttings are to 
post, coach, or rail, for a number of miles, then the 
second sort of cuttings will be best, as they may travel 
safely, hundreds of miles, wrapped in wadding and 
covered with brown paper. It is also preferable in 
every case, where a little patience can be exercised in 
producing a future effect, as that effect, ultimately, will 
be better, more quickly reached, and attended with much 
less trouble and care, than in the case of the seemingly 
more healthy and luxuriant rival. How is this? say 
some of our young readers. Just thus: these green 
points have been carrying on an elaborating-of-juice 
process—the older part of the stem first gets the ad¬ 
vantage of this, as the next-to-invisible buds are formed 
in the axils of the leaves before they drop; but at the 
points of the shoots these buds are only thinking about 
forming. You get a nice rooted plant quickly, it is true, 
and we by no means speak lightly of its pretensions— 
nay, if you wished to get it as high as possible in the 
shortest time there might be something to say in its 
favour ; but if you wish to give the plant a bush form, it 
is evident that you must pick out the point of your 
aspiring shoot to force the almost imperceptible buds 
to break into young shoots; while, in the cutting of the 
older wood, cut across at a joint, and with two or three 
joints above, you would have a young shoot from each 
of these joints, proceeding cotemporaneously with the 
