May 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
79 
stating in plain words, and still plainer writing, what 
is amiss with his plants, or whatever he may want to 
know, and an answer for him will be as studiously 
considered as if he were the Duke of Wellington 
himself; for all correspondents are on an equal footing 
in these pages, and in all other papers which aim at 
being useful; therefore there is no reason why any 
one in this fine oountry should stick up a gauky or 
unequal-sided geranium in liis window, like the one 
we are now considering. 
It is now too late in the season to rectify the 
error of unequal-sized shoots by stopping them, as, 
if they were to have only the least bit of the top 
broke oft', the flower-buds will be destroyed, and no 
more flower-buds will appear till new shoots are 
formed to produce them. In that case, the flower- 
buds on the two weaker branches had better be sacri¬ 
ficed, for, if they are left, they will not be very 
creditable, and by removing them the shoots will 
grow on and get stronger. By the time the flower- 
buds on the top of the strong shoot are well up 
above the foliage, and the shoot itself is grown a 
joint or two beyond where the footstalk of the flower 
head issued from, this shoot is to be stopped, in 
order to throw the whole strength of the plant into 
the flowers. This is always a wise measure for 
many plants, particularly the scarlet geranium; but, 
besides this, I have a particular object in view. By 
stopping the strongest shoot, and allowing the two 
inferior ones to proceed without flowering, they will 
soon be able to overtake their rival, which, having 
been stopped, will now be pushing up two or three 
shoots in place of one. Two of the best placed, 
however, should only be allowed to grow; and now 
we have four shoots that will be very nearly of equal 
strength, each of which will be allowed to produce a 
truss of bloom late in summer; and as soon as each 
truss or flower-head is well up above the leaves the 
shoot is to be stopped, more particularly if the sort 
be one of the very strong varieties—such as the 
Shrubland Scarlet, the best of this class ; Tam 
O'Shunter or Qoliah, two very nearly allied to the 
Shrubland Scarlet, and might pass for it in a crowd. 
For the dwarf and small growing scarlets, stopping 
the shoots before the trusses is not necessary; but 
let us follow the large sorts to the end of the season. 
If they are in very good health, our example plant 
will be in bloom full six weeks. The four shoots 
must not be allowed to form side branches, although 
they may make vigorous attempts to break out into 
new shoots where they have been stopped. By the 
time the last of the four trusses begins to fade, the 
plant has done its work for that season. 
Now, recollect this is perfectly indispensable for car¬ 
rying out a new system of growing these large trussed 
scarlets, which I shall often have to allude to as 
something much out of the common ivay. Young 
plants—that is, two-year old plants—are only to be 
allowed to produce one set of bloom in a season, like 
a common window geranium, although, if allowed, 
they would go on flowering to the end of the season. 
All the dwarf sorts may go on flowering as long as they 
will; but, beside these, I should much wish to hear 
of a couple of these large scarlets attempted on this 
new plan by every reader of The Cottage Gar¬ 
dener. Some readers no doubt will smile at this, 
and so would I some years back, but the age for 
pooh-poohing is gone past; and when a meritorious 
object like this is to be attained, it is much better to 
put our shoulders to the wheel, and place the vehicle 
of improvement on the broad railway gauge, than 
arrest its progress by laughing its friends out of 
countenance. As a further inducement, I may men¬ 
tion that some of the first gardeners in the country 
are just beginning to adopt this new system of 
growing these large scarlet geraniums for furnishing- 
large conservatories, living-rooms, staircases, and the 
like, for the highest nobility in the land, and D. 
Beaton among the rest. No wonder, therefore, that 
he would thus early take the bull by the horns; not 
to let him into a china-shop, however, but to place 
him quietly on the window-sill. This, like many 
other improvements in plant-growing, is fully as 
much adapted to the cottage as to the palace gar¬ 
dener. The grand foundation of the system is, that 
the plants are not allowed to bloom but once in a 
season; that the shoots are all to be reared of equal 
strength, or as near to that as art can do it; that no 
small side shoots be allowed to interfere with the 
growth of the principal flowering shoots; that these 
be stopped one joint before the flower stem; and 
that as soon as the plants are done flowering they 
should be tinned out of doors to ripen their growth 
in some warm sheltered place. Here the plants are 
to be liberally watered, but no fresh growth allowed; 
every little shoot is to be rubbed off as soon as per¬ 
ceived : the bottoms of the flowering shoots will 
turn to a glossy brown by-and-by, indicating a 
degree of ripeness favourable to the next year’s crop 
of flowers. Any tune between the middle of August 
and the end of September these shoots are to be cut 
down close—say to within two joints of the older 
wood—or, if any of them be weaker than the rest, it 
must be cut to one joint. For a week or ten days 
before cutting the plants, like all other geraniums, 
they ought to receive but very little water; this will 
prevent their “ bleeding,” as we say when the sap of a 
plant drops or oozes out from the cut. A few days 
after cutting, the wounds will have dried sufficiently 
to stop this bleeding, and then the plants may be 
watered, to set them growing again; and by the 
time the fresh shoots are an inch or two long, you 
must look them all over to thin out the supernu¬ 
merary ones. A great deal of the success of the 
system depends on this part of the business being 
done properly. If any of the shoots before they 
were cut down were much stronger than the rest, 
you may allow them to bear three new ones for next 
season; and see that you make choice of those best 
situated to form a regular head for the plant. Then 
the next-sized shoots may have two left on, and the 
weaker ones, if any, must be trained with one shoot 
only. The probability is, therefore, that the whole 
will come up of very nearly the same length and 
strength next season, blooming at the same time ; 
and if they do, and every thing has gone on in the 
right way to that time, depend upon it our gracious 
Queen will not have a better specimen of good gar¬ 
dening for the whole season. Talk of growing pine¬ 
apples as big as turnips, and grapes as large as 
plums, why that is nothing compared to a Shrubland 
scarlet geranium, with nine, ten, or a dozen of its 
immense trusses of bloom of the size that I antici¬ 
pate ! 
And now we may as well finish about the right 
compost, the watering and wintering, and also the 
spring cultivation, so as to make the whole sys¬ 
tem complete in itself. These large kinds partake 
much of the character of succulent plants—such as, 
for instance, cactus, aloes, and suchlike things—and 
these not only require particularly good drainage, 
but a good deal of small charcoal or old lime rub¬ 
bish, like that used for the mignonette, to be mixed 
with the compost, in order to keep it open and porous 
