133 
TILE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN. June 7, 1859. 
potted plants into a cold frame at the end of 3%, to 
keep tbe frame well aired and partially shaded alwday, 
and to take off the glass entirely during the night, and 
to sprinkle over the leaves late in the evenings of clear 
and dry days, with a rosed watering-pot. Three weeks, 
or, say the whole month of June, spent that way will lay 
the very surest foundation for healthy plants and for a 
vigorous growth during the next nine or ten weeks—say, 
trom the 1st of July to the middle of September. Every 
plant in England, be it a stove plant, or an alpine, dislikes 
the sun all through June, and grows, planted in good soil 
and proper situations, out of doors better than in any 
other way, during the months of July and August. Try 
the Ixoras in the American beds; the Vincas and Clero- 
dendrons among the Cape Broccoli; and the variegated 
Geraniums on the Vine-border, or on one just as good 
and as well sheltered, and the result will be what I say. 
Then all young stock, for pot-furnishing, is to be half 
forced in subdued light through the month of June 
during the day, and half retarded at night in a low, moist 
temperature, in order to get the roots so much in ad¬ 
vance of the branches, and to avoid the extremes of mid¬ 
summer weather. At the beginning of July they are to 
be planted out at good distances apart, to run up as far 
as the border can stimulate without the one interfering 
or hurting the other, and so on from that time to the 
middle of September. TV hen they are lifted, some care is 
bestowed in training them, just as if they were in pots ; 
but the work is more in the name than in the doing. 
A young Geranium of very limited growth, such as is 
the Golden Chain, which was struck last February, and 
brought in last April and May, and put through this 
most simple exercise on to next September, will increase 
just four times in three months, going it as fast as an 
express train all the while. But mind me, the plan is far 
too fast and too good for ordinary kinds of common 
Geraniums ; for I have it to the very letter in full force 
myself, and I can assure you there never was a plan 
which paid so well in so short a time. 
Yet it is but one-half of the journey to the top of the 
hill of fame. The other half I cannot get over, else I 
might be tempted to keep the secret, in order to astonish' 
all London with such thorough bushes of those kinds of 
plants which other people despaired of seeing half so 
big or so fine in a lifetime. It is after the middle of 
September that the disposition to make flowers more 
than growth ceases with most of the Perpetual Gera¬ 
niums, and it is then that some bedclers go too much 
to leaf, and get rubbishy; that is the time to take the 
advantage for the second part of this process. 'The plants 
are cut round a little at the roots a week before lifting, 
and the slits made in the soil at the cutting are filled up 
with water for fear of a check. The plants are lifted and 
potted most carefully, and no root, or branch, is touched, 
and very little soil is taken with the roots ; watered they 
must be, of course, and their leaves are never let dry, 
night or day, for the rest of September, and all that 
time the plants must be entirely in the open air. To 
put them into any kind of pit or house, hot or cold, is 
not half so good at that particular period; but the sun 
must not reach them the whole time, nor the places about 
them be dry for one hour together. Early in October 
they may be put into a cold pit, to guard against frost at 
night, more than for shelter from the weather and to get 
the benefit of the sun, as young roots get sufficiently 
active to sustain the leaves from flagging. When the pots 
are full of young roots—say, by the very end of October, 
the plants are to get a large shift, to last till next May, 
and the winter treatment then begins : the pots are 
plunged in bottom heat, and the place is never under 
50° at night the whole winter, be the frost ever so 
hard. The day temperature is from 55° to 70° more or 
less by the sun, but not more than 60° by fire heat. 
One winter season of this work, after such a summer 
treatment, will make any one of the slow-growing and 
short-jointed Geraniums, and all the variegated ones, 
grow as much as fully four years of the best pot manage^ 
ment in the usual way. A young, healthy Golden Chain, 
on that system, would soon be as big as those Pelargoniums 
they take to the Shows, and grow in pure yellow loam, 
rotten dung, and a little sand just as well as Petruchio. 
I have been waiting for leave to mention where I had 
seen such Golden Chains this very spring; but the time 
for going about the work admitted no more delay. I 
shall have some lights constantly at work all this summer 
exactly as here described; but it is an old game, and 
must vary a little with the weather. When the wind ia 
high the lights are not drawn off at night; if there is too' 
much wet it is the same; when it is parching hot a thin 
mat covers the whole of the glass from nine in the morn¬ 
ing till six at night, and the inside is syringed twice in the 
day, and the back ends of the lights are lifted four inches 
for air all day long. My object, however } is not specimen 
culture, but to apply this, the highest style of cultivation, 
to the objects of cross-breeding ; and if 1 could follow the 
hobby the year round, with the bottom heat and stove 
temperature in winter, I would do something which some 
one else will do assuredly after I am gone, if not before.' 
D. Beaton. 
RESULTS OF EXPERIENCE IN THE CULTURE 
OF BEDDING PLANTS. 
1st. Do not be in too great a hurry in planting. Fre¬ 
quently friends call here and tell me that such a one has 
finished bedding by the end of April, or the first week ill 
May. I seldom turn out anything of consequence until 
the last fortnight in May. I generally have a good 
deal to do after the 1st of June. I have also tried 
early planting ; but, looking at the results as testified in 
my own practice and what I observe in the case of others, 
I see no reason to approve of very early planting. Of 
course, the season must regulate the time; and had I 
known we should have had such nice rains about the 
middle of the month, and dry, warm weather right on. td 
its close, I might have been tempted to plant earlier/ 
though eveu then I might not have gained much by tins 
process; for 
2nd. The state of the ground as respects heat and 
working dryness is of more importance than any mere 
specified day in May, or earlier. Most of the plants' 
used for bedding are of a tender character. A chill at 
the roots injures them very much. The wetter the soil, 
if the weather is cold and sunless, the more apt will tket 
roots be to suffer. From this chill at the roots many 
plants look miserable all the summer, and beds and 
ribbon-borders are rendered blanky and uneven. Iron! 
this and other causes we have read praises of borders, 
that some of our neighbours, if they had the like, would 
try and contrive that visitors should not see them. Much 
may be done by duly hardening off the plants ; though 
sometimes, and especially if the plants are in pots, some 
injury is done here if the process is effected at an early 
period by too rapid changes. We have turned out plants 
in pots that were standing out of doors in the beginning 
of May that had scarcely a healthy root close to the sides 
of the pots. 
Taking care to harden off gradually, the next great 
thing is to have the soil warm before planting. I prefer, 
therefore, in fine weather, for the first eighteen days of 
May, in general seasons, to fork the beds over frequently, 
so as to turn in the heat from the sunbeams, instead of 
planting when the ground is comparatively cold. In¬ 
stead of being chilled, the roots are thus encouraged to 
extend themselves at once. To encourage this still more 
in heavy soils, it is a good plan to give each plant a small 
handful of compost made of road drift, leaf mould, and 
burnt earth and refuse—the latter having still some heat 
in it—so as to make the compost rather warmer than the 
natural soil; and which neutralises any cooling effect 
