THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN'S COMPANION, Januaey 27, 1857. 293 
and Baron Hugel. The average temperature is 40°, air very 
dry, and on day and night, unless the glass is below 30°, 
abundance of room, and the roots pot-bound. The plants 
were never out of the sun from the time they were cuttings, 
nor were their parents or grand-parents. 
The best degree of heat for keeping flowering scarlet Gera¬ 
niums in winter is not yet fully determined, but the air must 
he dry and constantly in a pure state, and also constantly in 
motion if possible. We often keep the flues going with air 
on top and bottom, and in frosty weather we get the flues 
pretty hot before we shut up. Single trusses then keep in 
blossom aboiw eight weeks. Your leaves were dying for want 
of air, or change of air.] 
PRUNING HEATHS.—DIRECTIONS TO MANSIONS. 
“ It has struck me to suggest that the promised list of 
select Cape Heaths would be additionally interesting and 
useful if it gave information as to which of them should be 
freely cut down after blooming, which of the shoots merely 
pinched, and which, if any, left entirely without pruning. 
I am only interested at present as to the treatment in this 
respect of the following varieties :— Erica Weslcottii, Arche- 
riana, Linrueoides snperba, aristata vittata, and grandinosa. 
Of the rest of those I cultivate at present the treatment in 
this respect I am informed of. 
“May I be allowed another suggestion?—That some of 
the interesting accounts of noblemen’s and other places well 
deserving inspection, published by you from time to time in 
the pages of The Cottage Gaedenee, have appeared to me 
deficient in information as to the precise locality, not even 
the county or nearest town of importance being named, pre¬ 
suming, I suppose, that every one must have the requisite 
knowledge of the whereabouts of these places, so well known 
for some distance round in their respective neighbourhoods. 
I have no doubt many besides myself have felt the desirable¬ 
ness of more precise information in connection with these 
localities. What I wish is, that a tabular list be published 
of places already so described in The Cottage Gaedenee, 
with their situations; from what railway-stations they are 
most easy of access; whether accessible by payment of a 
moderate fee ; what days of the week they may be seen, if con¬ 
fined to certain days, and so forth. Such a list would be very 
useful for reference to many intending tourists, who, for want 
of such information easily come at, are liable to pass such 
places without being aware of their close proximity to their 
track.”— Ceavenensis. 
[Your suggestions are seasonable, and shall be attended 
to, and we are obliged by your hints. With regard to pruning 
Heaths it is only necessary to attend to the habits of 
growth of the different species in order to arrive at the 
knowledge what to do in that respect with each. We will 
take for instance the few kinds that you name. Erica 
Westcottii is a moderate grower, sending forth many branches 
naturally; hence the pruning necessary in order to keep the 
plant in form only amounts to shortening in any shoots 
that may take the lead of the rest. E. Archeriana is a 
strong grower, and should have every strong shoot shortened 
in immediately after the blooming is over. In general each 
yearly shoot should be cut in to half its length, and, in 
order to make room for the new shoots, the outer branches 
should be tied or spread out to sticks placed at the outside 
of the bush. Erica Linnwoides snperba, is also a free grower, 
and should be cut in more severely, and that operation should 
he performed directly after the bloom is over, and then the 
plant should be allowed to make some growth previous to 
repotting. Erica aristata var. vittata is a slow grower, and 
all it requires in pruning is merely to nip off, with the 
finger and thumb, the extreme points. 
These three classes of Heaths embrace the whole of the 
tribe that are fast growers, medium growers, and slow growers. 
The only point to attend to is a firm resolution to prune them 
well-in the moment the blooming season is over, in order to 
give time for the new shoots to grow sufficiently strong to 
bloom freely the following season. 
With regard to your second suggestion, namely, the situa¬ 
tions of any places described in our pages, we believe, for 
the most part, the writers of those pages do mention all that 
you name. Perhaps in some of the earlier numbers that 
desirable information may not have been given so fully. 
You mention “accessible by payment of'a moderate fee.” 
We fear, if that were alluded to at all, it would be offensive 
both to the owner of such places and the gardener also. We 
have requested our contributors, when they describe places 
they may visit and give a report of them, to attend to giving 
the locality, and by what means they may be reached. No 
doubt a tabular list of every good garden in Great Britain 
would be useful to tourists, and any information as to the 
public days, if any, on which the place or places are allowed 
by the owner to be seen by strangers. There are a few of 
that description in the country, but that restriction only 
amounts to indiscriminate visitors. There are very few 
indeed so exclusive as not to admit respectable garden- 
loving tourists at any reasonable hour of the day all the year 
round.] 
PLANTING VINE-BUDS.—CUTTINGS OE ROSES 
IN WINTER. 
“I shall be obliged for the information when it is the 
proper time to plant the eyes of Vines for propagation, and 
if they will require a moderate hotbed to forward them. I 
have the cut shoots kept in a pot of earth, their ends about j 
three inches covered with earth. I should also like to know i 
if the bottom of the eye should be cut straight across or j 
sloping. 
“ I have just purchased a good plant of the Rose Beauty \ 
of Billiard , and I wish to try and propagate it. I find by a 
Rose catalogue it is a Hybrid China. I wish to know if this 
Rose will succeed by cuttings. There are more shoots than j 
should be left to flower. I should be obliged by informa- | 
tion how the cuttings should be made for striking; also if 
the cuttings should be covered with a glass.”—M. F. 
[The Vine eyes will be time enough, and more safe under j 
the circumstances, if you leave the cuttings out of doors in 
the ground till the first week in April, then to cut the shoot | 
a little away from the top and bottom of the eye right across, 
and then to form both ends into a wedge shape by a slant 
cut from the opposite side of the eye, and press the wedge 
sides down in the centre of a small pot till the eye is just 
out of sight, and no more. One eye in one pot is best, and 
the back of a Cucumber frame in April is as good as any 
J other place. But such eyes may be “ put in ” from October } 
' to April, and that behind a wall, in sand, as for cuttings, ! 
when most beautiful Vine plants will come from them the 
following summer; then to be cut down to one or two eyes 
in October, and to be planted out “ for good ” the following 
February. Gardeners make eye cuttings any time after the 
1 new year. 
Cuttings of the Beauty of Billiard Rose will only give five 
rooted plants out of the dozen when they are put in so late 
as this. Slip off the smaller shoots out of the socket as it 
were—then you have a heel to each cutting; trim off the 
jagged bark round the heel, and cut the shoot to four inches, 
and you have the best mode of Rose cuttings. Plant them 
in pure sand, and three inches deep, in a shady place. If 
there is one inch of sand about the bottom of the cutting it 
is enough. See that they do not get too dry any time during 
the summer. A hand-glass over them will be of great ser¬ 
vice if you watch against damp. ' The bottom of the cutting 
ought to be made as firm in the soil as possible.] 
EVERGREEN AND DECIDUOUS SHRUBS FOR A 
TOWN CHURCHYARD. 
“ Will you favour me with a list of Evergreen and De¬ 
ciduous Shrubs suitable for a churchyard situated in the 
centre of a county town, as 1 find many varieties will not 
stand the smoke ? Likewise oblige me with instructions 
relative to the preparation of the ground and planting."— 
A. Z. 
[Box, Yew, and Aucuba Japonica are the best evergreens 
to stand the smoke of towns; Lilacs, Snowberry plants, 
Laburnums, Guelder Roses, and common Honeysuckle the 
best flowering deciduous trees. If the ground is hard, as is 
most likely the case, it ought to be trenched two spits deep, 
and that without a day’s delay, as the plants ought to be 
