330 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
September 
tion and culture; and, lastly, we will mention that 
the authoress of “ My Flowers” will contribute her 
gentle dew-drops in a weekly narrative of “ Our Vil¬ 
lage Walks.” 
We will commence our lectures on The Principles 
of Gardening by considering what those principles 
are which should he regarded in the practice of sow¬ 
ing. Sowing has for its object to secure to the seeds 
such circumstances as jwill best promote not only 
their germination, or sprouting, but the growth of 
the plants proceeding from them, so as to yield for 
the gardener that produce which he desires. Let us 
consider what are those circumstances. 
In the first place it is essential that the seed has 
a perfectly formed embryo, or young plant, within 
it—such as that little heart-shaped body at the point 
of a walnut’s kernel—and that it has arrived to 
nearly perfect ripeness. The reason for this is ob¬ 
vious : the young plant requires for its earliest nou¬ 
rishment a peculiar compound, usually saccharine 
or sugary matter; and this compound, in accordance 
with that universal fitness of things which demon¬ 
strates the wisdom of God, is always generated by 
the combined agency of heat, moisture, and oxygen 
gas,* from the substances most abundant in the fully 
ripened seed. Let barley he the example. Saccha¬ 
rine matter is essential for the first nourishment of 
the radicle, or first root, and plumule, or first stem 
and leaves, of the seedling, and into such saccharine 
matter is starch converted by the combined agency 
we have named. It is starch, therefore, that is the 
chief constituent of the seed. But if barley be ga¬ 
thered imperfect, and is dried, the chief ingredient is 
mucilage or gum; and this, if exposed to the essen¬ 
tials for germination—heat, moisture, and oxygen gas 
—instead of passing into saccharine matter, is con¬ 
verted into acetic acid, or vinegar, and the seed decays 
instead of sprouting. 
As it is necessary that every seed should have 
nearly attained to ripeness before it acquires the 
power of germinating, and that the more perfect 
the ripeness the more perfect and the more healthy 
that germination, so is it equally certain that the 
length of time it retains the power to germinate dif¬ 
fers in almost every plant. The seed of the coffee 
shrub loses all power to grow unless sown within a 
few weeks after it has been gathered, whilst [that of 
the melon improves by being stored for one or two 
years, and celery remains capable of germinating for 
five times the last-named period.f These and all 
* Oxygen gas is a chief constituent of the air, without] which gas 
neither a seed could sprout nor an animal breathe. 
t Melon seeds, by keeping, improve only in the sense in which 
gardeners consider the plant improved, viz., less of stem is produced, 
and the fruit is matured earlier. Whatever checks the development 
of the early organs, the radicle and plumule, produces this effect, and 
this is effected by age in the melon seed; its starchy component 
diminishes in quantity, being gradually converted into albumen, a 
substance like the white of an egg. This is less easily changed to the 
soluble matters necessary for the nourishment of the parts of the 
plant first developed; 
other instances within our knowledge demonstrate 
that the more starchy and other matters, into which 
nitrogen does not enter as a constituent, that a seed 
contains, the longer will it retain its power to grow, 
and two familiar instances are common rice and the 
kidney bean.]; Rice contains 85 per cent, of starch, 
and will retain its vegetative powers for many years; 
whilst kidney beans, which contain one-third their 
weight of animo-vegetable matter and other consti¬ 
tuents, of which nitrogen is a component, will not 
vegetate healthily a second season. 
This speedy loss of growing power to which seeds 
abounding in nitrogenous matter are liable, is just 
what the chemist would predict, for all bodies so con¬ 
stituted are most prone to decomposition and decay. 
At the same time, let us not be misconceived as 
saying that such are the only chemical causes for a 
seed’s shortened or lengthened retention of its grow¬ 
ing powers; on the contrary, we are well aware that 
there are other causes, and for example may be taken 
many seeds abounding with oil These, exposed to the 
free operation of the air, gradually lose their vitality, 
or power to grow, as the oil they contain becomes ran¬ 
cid. Preserved from the action of the air, no seeds 
are more retentive of vitality, apparently because 
when so preserved the oil they contain will remain 
sweet and unchanged for ages. This is the reason 
that in earth excavated from great depths below the 
surface, charlock, mustard, and such like plants, 
having oily seeds, are found to have retained their 
vitality. 
In considering this subject, let it ever be kept in 
mind that almost every species of seed has a peculiar 
degree of heat, and a peculiar amount of moisture, 
at or approaching to which its vitality will be excited 
into action. Therefore, in all observations on the 
life-retaining power of seeds, and in conclusions de¬ 
duced from experiment, it must be carefully secured 
that they have not been excited to those first steps 
of germination, which steps, if taken and then 
checked, invariably cause the destruction of a seed’s 
vital powers. 
This brings us to the consideration of the contin¬ 
gencies necessary to cause a seed’s germination. 
We may accept as a rule that no bouquet will be 
strikingly excellent in which red flowers do not pre¬ 
dominate, and in this it resembles the chief produc¬ 
tions of the greatest historical painters; it may be 
called the key-note of their most successful efforts in 
colouring. Thus, bouquets of roses alone, or of gera¬ 
niums alone, mingled with green for shade, are beau¬ 
tiful objects ; but bouquets of yellow flowers, such as 
marigolds or esclioltzias, alone would be intolerably 
glaring. It is the same with other decorations— 
scarlet curtains and crimson velvet dresses are rich 
t Nitrogen is another gas found largely in the air we breathe ; it is 
a chief part also of ammonia. 
i 
