366 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
Such placed in any ordinary structure require much 
fuss in shading, &c., and are liable to many mishaps; 
but here, the “ man of all work” may at once place his 
newly-potted stock or his cuttings on the back shelf, not 
fearing a sudden glare of light, and the ceremony of 
shading and unshading dispensed with, except in ex¬ 
treme cases; for tho majority of such things get just as 
much light as they require. 
We would, in building such a house, place it a little out 
of the cardinal points, giving it a slight turn to the south¬ 
east ; this turn must, however, he slight. This will have 
the effect of throwing the mild rays of the evening sun 
into the north part, which will he of immense benefit, 
not only in point of a mild light, but as enabling the 
cultivator to “ put his plants to bed warm”—a homely 
gardening phrase, signifying the indulgence in the 
maximum point of temperature when all danger from 
scorching is over. This practice we have always consi 
dered one of the fundamental principles of good forcing. 
R. Errington. 
THE FLOWER-GARDEN. 
Annuals.— The “ Exhibition of 1851,” in Mr. Paxton’s 
beautiful glass house, on a slice of Hyde Park, bids fair 
to set people thinking about the best and simplest 
methods of erecting their plant houses in future. In¬ 
stead of leaning them against walls for support, as at 
present, we shall find that it is possible to make them 
stand on their own legs, and still he as cheaply heated, 
and far better, for plants, grapes, peaches, and all. Rut 
these are not the only reasons for my thus referring to 
the Exhibition of 1851, hut, rather, to ask the great 
London gardeners, who have been at issue with me on 
the subject of annuals for years past, how are they going 
to dress up their flower-gardens next May and June? 
For, depend on it, these expositors of arts and sciences 
from foreign parts will swarm over the country like 
locusts; and, although they may do no more harm to 
our crops than butterflies, it will go hard against the 
grain with us, if they go home and tell their wives that 
we had no flower crops worth speaking of. And let it 
not be thought for one moment that two or three hun¬ 
dreds of railroad miles will hinder them from going 
down to distant parts of the provinces. The Caledonian 
Lochs, and the Lakes of Ivillarney, and all the inter¬ 
vening places of note will not escape their prying 
curiosity ; and, as if to prove the adage, “ that it never 
rains but it pours,” here, in Ipswich, we are to have the 
“British Association” next summer; so that, between 
ono gathering or another, our flower-gardens all over 
the country are in a fair way of being visited by 
strangers, who, no doubt, have heard much of our gar¬ 
dening skill in this country from the reports of our great 
exhibitions, and from travellers who have visited us on 
purpose to see our style and mode of gardening. 
I am persuaded that, in the country at least, we shall 
learn more substantial gardening—that is, in the way 
of dressing our pleasure grounds in May and June— 
during tho next year or two, through the influence of 
this great exhibition, than we have done for the last ten 
years, notwithstanding all our books, exhibitions, and 
medals; indeed, these great competitions in London in 
the months of May, June, and July in each year, have 
just done as much to hinder the progress of our art in 
many of its most essential branches, as they have done 
m raising that of growing plants in pots far above all 
other attempts in any other part of the world. Even 
this department of pot plant culture suffers tremen- 
duously through the very patronage which has expended 
its thousands upon thousands to rear it to its present 
standard of excellence. None of the great spirits, who 
have carried off medals enough to fill an ordinary sized 
[Sei j tember 12. 1 
barrowq care a single straw for the best plant in the 
catalogue unless they can, with a little cooking, get it 
into flower to stand one of the great competitions; and 
after the exhibition season is over, the competition plants 
have all the force and indulgence of the master and 
man expended on them for the rest of the year. Not 
only that, but their pockets are generally well lined with 
money, and they can thus encourage the best country 
gardeners to flock to London for higher w r ages, to the 
disadvantage of country establishments ; and, after all 
this, there are those in distant parts of the country who 
know so little of the spirit and machinery, and the loss 
to gardening too, by which these London exhibitions 
are “ got up,” that they partly believe the London style 
could be carried out in the provinces ; and sure enough 
it coidd, if country people would forego the pleasures 
and refinements of country gardening for nine or ten 
months in the year, in order to “ get up” a score or two 
of huge bushes so covered with blossoms as to make 
their neighbours stare for a day or two, or for as many 
weeks, in the height of summer. Those of us, there¬ 
fore, who have so far imbibed this false taste of growing 
plants so far beyond their natural capacities that no art 
can save many of them more than a few weeks after 
they have been “ exhibited,” will now, or, rather, will 
find out next summer, that flower-gardening, and the 
decorations of our home—sweet home!—are, after all, 
the best and most elegant branches of our art. Let us, 
therefore, prove to all the world how well we understand 
this out-door gardening of ours. Who would have 
thought, when we first heard of the “ Exhibition of 
1851,” that it would have created all this stir throughout 
the country ? The writer feels the force of all this: he, 
too, has got his foot into the tight boot, and has only 
one good leg to stand on. 
There is no other means of having a full flower-garden 
in May, according to our present style of decoration, 
than that of using annuals, sown about this time, to 
stand over the winter as best they may in the open 
ground, and to be transplanted into the beds from the 
beginning or middle of March to the end of April, 
according to the forwardness or lateness of the season, 
and as the beds are ready for them. As most of these 
annuals do not hold in bloom above a month, another 
set of them should be sown by the end of February, 
also in the open ground, and again in the first and 
second week in April; but not one of them to be sown 
where they are to flower, if summer bedding plants are 
to succeed them. The whole must be transplanted from 
time to time in regular rows, and then in May the bed¬ 
ding stuff must be planted out in the intervening spaces 
between the annuals. This is neither new nor dangerous. 
I have done so over and over again. Indeed, for ana- 
gallis and very weak plants of that habit, and for ver¬ 
benas that have been struck in a hurry late, I prefer this 
plan of sheltering them at first turning out, to the usual 
way of exposing them on the naked beds. Some people 
put boughs of evergreens round the beds for a few days i 
after planting out, and 1 have done so occasionally, and j 
when no one was expected to see the garden in the mean 
time, we made a shift with them; but I must confess 
the practice is too slovenly and namhj pamby. 
In the winter, when the dead leaves are flying in all 
directions, and one can hardly find more hands than will 
keep the walks clean, 1 have for years past used evergreen 
boughs stuck here and thero in the naked flower-beds, 
to break their raw appearance; and I like the plan 
much, although 1 have had to stand a good many raps 
from critics, who ought to know better, for recommend¬ 
ing it to others; but save me from planting evergreen 
boughs next May along with the verbenas and petunias. 
The worst of this plan is, that in a long bud winter and 
a late spring, such as the last, many of these annuals 
are liable to go off, and to think of preserving them in 
