THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, Dkcembeb 28, 1858. 
192 
which I could not help writing. Are these Crocuses very- 
early, or very late P The question is a puzzler. When I 
first sent in new Potatoes for Sir William Middleton’s 
Christmas dinner, and prided myself on being so early 
with them, the worthy Baronet “ took me off” at my 
own price, and declared that he had never had new Po¬ 
tatoes so late as mine all the years he had kept gardeners 
After that, I took especial care that Sir William should 
have his first dish of early Potatoes for his first dinner of 
the new year ; and all that he could urge to the contrary 
would not convince me that there was any merit in being 
the last on the list of early producers of new Potatoes. 
But, if I failed in being in at Christmas with new Po¬ 
tatoes, I never missed taking advantage of the first op¬ 
portunity which offered for potting Crocuses, for forcing, 
after I once saw them above ground, as on the day when 
this is written. From having done so for ten years 
running, I hold it as a maxim, that Crocuses are never, 
under any circumstances, in a better condition for potting, 
to force, than at that very point of their progress ; also, 
that if the bulbs had been three years established before 
then, and were in a healthy, thriving condition, the re¬ 
moval of them, in lumps and patches, with all their roots 
unimpaired, had no perceptible ill effects on the size, 
healtli, and duration of the flowers; indeed, I was often 
sure that the removal of the roots into pots, at that par¬ 
ticular period, was in favour of a superior bloom. I am 
of that opinion still, and know that Crocuses, which are 
potted as I say, may be forced, to come in before others 
of the same kind which were potted last September and 
October, because they will bear more extra heat. I could 
give the reason why the same kind of Crocus can bear 
double the heat under different circumstances, according 
to the way the first part of the growth was brought 
about; but these are not the times to trouble readers with 
profound reasoning. Anybody who may have Crocuses 
in pots, from last autumn potting, may soon prove what I 
say, by taking up and potting a few of the first Crocuses 
they may see about the garden ; and those who may wish 
to prove how easily they will force, and how much better 
the flowers will be from potting so late as this, must not 
lose much time now, as we may soon expect a ticklish 
frost. 
So much for times past. For the time present, who 
would not think it a misfortune to have all the spring 
bulbs out of the ground at Christmas F Crocuses, Tulips, 
Hyacinths, Narcissus, Scillas, Dog’s-tooth Violets, in all 
their vast varieties, not to bloom in profusion as our 
Lilies of the field and garden—that is, as spring flowers — 
would, indeed, be a blank. Well, we have not planted 
any of these bulbs yet, in the Experimental Garden ; and 
we have not done so purposely, in order to be able, with 
a proof in hand, to tell the world that there need never 
be much fuss and hurry in planting these spring bulbs, 
iii the autumn, before the beds and borders are hardly 
cleared of the bedding plants, and, above all, before the 
beds are properly prepared for the next summer’s crop. 
Suppose there is a large clump of Boses that are not 
doing very well, the end of October is early enough to 
remove them, to root-prune them, to select the best of 
them to be planted there again, and to buy newer, or 
more superior kinds, to make that clump, or bed, more 
telling next season. Then, that clump, or bed, lias to be 
trenched ; lots of the bottom soil must be wheeled 
away, and lots more of the best Bose soil, and the best 
rotten dung, must be. wheeled to take the place of the bad 
bottom ; then the top of the bed is to be mixed—half of 
fresh soil, half of the old soil, and as much of the rotten 
dung as one can spare. Then there is the planting 
the tallest plants in the centre, or at the backmost row, 
and the kinds are to be suited according to their different 
colours. All this takes a good deal of time and con¬ 
sideration, for people do not plant, in these days, hap¬ 
hazardly. Then, suppose ever so many things of that 
sort having to be done in one garden, in one year, there 
is no time to do it, unless it is done between the taking 
up, or killing, of the bedding plants, and getting in the 
spring bulbs. Then, take the average of seasons, and 
where will you find a family who will agree to have the 
beds disturbed before the frost makes them look shabby ; 
and in how many seasons out of ten that frost does not 
come till the middle, or end, of November? I have had 
the best bed, at Shrubland Park, out some years till the 
Christmas week ; and, after that, had to change more than 
one-half of the soil in it for the next crop, before I could 
plant a bulb in it; so that that bed was not worse off 
than all our beds are just now, at the Experimental, as 
very many beds must necessarily be every year of our 
ives, in all parts of the country. 
But about that particular Bose-bed, just mentioned, you 
see how late it must have been for spring bulbs to have 
done much good in it the following spring, yet the arrange¬ 
ment was, that the Boses were to stand for three years un¬ 
changed, or unmoved. In the centre, between the middle 
Boses, were to be planted the taller Narcissus—as Soleil 
d’Or, Double Homan and liazelman major, States-Generaf 
and Gh’and Monarque —all white ones, except the Soleil 
d’ Or. Then a row of tall double Tulips was to run round, 
but not very close — such as Rex Rubrorum, Toumesol, 
and Manage de ma Fille, each in equal quantities. Then 
three rows of Hyacinths—scarlet, white, and blue; or 
Waterloo and Grootvorst, as scarlet, next the double 
Tulips. Then a white row of whites and blushes—as 
Prince of Waterloo, A-la-Mode, Queen of England, and 
Anna Maria, which are about the best sorts for that style 
of arrangement. The blues were in equal tints of light and 
gray blue, and dark blue—as Amiens and Charles Dickens, 
Orondatus and Raron Van Tuyll, two of the best shades 
of porcelain blue. In front of them, and in a closer row, 
were to be a complete ring of that prince of all early 
Tulips, the bold, majestic, large, brilliant flower, called 
Vermilion Brillant ; and in front of all, a wide band of 
mixed Crocuses—a large yellow, a large white, and a 
large blue, and a streaked white—say, Sir Walter Scott. 
Now, suppose that a running frost of three weeks sets 
in on the very night the Boses were planted, and before 
a single one of all these jmlbs were got, or could possibly 
be got into a bed, and, after the frost, a whole week of 
slushy weather,—the gardener blowing his fingers, or 
scratching his head, in sheer vexation and despair,—and 
you will have one picture out of a thousand of different 
shades of merit, which are photographed every autumn in 
the country. Then, if you can realise the one thousandth- 
part of this style of gardening, you will agree with me, 
that it would be a happy release to get out of it alto¬ 
gether. I do not mean getting out of it by suicide, 
or in any other way, but by preparing the spring bulbs 
to come ready to our hand just at the precise moment 
we are ready for them, even were that not before the be¬ 
ginning of February. Pot them, to be sure, and pot them 
as early in August as you can get them over from Holland. 
There is a grand secret in potting all bulbs which cast 
their leaves and rest awhile, long before it is natural for 
them to be planted in the open ground ; -therefore, pot 
as many as possible. But where on earth are all the pots 
to come from ? or who can buy so many, and find stand¬ 
ing room for them afterwards? Nothing of the kind. 
Not one single bulb for our show next spring has been 
potted. We never pot any of them, because we have 
got. the knack of removing them in May, without hurting 
their leaves. The way we do—and a most excellent way 
it is—is this : when we pot all the best bulbs, as we think, 
for forcing and for blooming in the conservatory, we put 
them, pots and all, under ashes in the usual way ; and then 
follow out the different kinds after them, like planting 
Potato sets with the spade. We make a drill in leaf 
mould and rotten refuse, as we would open a space 
in the front of digging for the Potato sets. The bulbs 
are put in that way, and two inches apart, and they are 
covered from one to two inches deep, according to their 
