322 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, FmrAHT 22, 1859. 
taken in connection with tlie course of culture resolved 
upon for the future. The conclusion is, “ In nature we 
find, in general, but one growth for the season. Is it 
not, therefore, contrary to nature, to force these plants 
into bloom in the spring, and afterwards to make them 
grow again, to ripen their buds for the next season ? 
The course of culture resolved upon, is “ to allow such 
plants after flowering to remain in the conservatory until 
the spring, when they can be put into heat, to bring them 
into flower, and then be removed into the conservatory, 
and so on.” Now, it strikes me to be somewhat in accor¬ 
dance with logic, that if it is unnatural to force plants, 
by extra heat, to grow after flowering, it would be equally 
unnatural to force them into flower in the spring, or any 
other time. 
However much may be advanced, rightly, respecting 
natural laws, when treating upon plant culture, there can 
be no question that much that is said about certain modes 
being in unison with, or in opposition to, nature, is just 
high-sounding phraseology to conceal our ignorance. I 
listened not long ago to a somewhat learned discussion as 
to the cause of an unfortunate result,—one ascribing it 
to what he called a clearly-manifest natural law ; a secoud 
saying it was owing to a peculiar concentration of the de¬ 
composing powers of light; a third affirming it was 
owing to terrestrial radiation in unison with the galvanic 
powers; and a fourth, as certain as he was of his own 
existence, that it was entirely owing to electro-chemical 
agency. 
Now, after keeping two ears open, and the mouth 
ready to catch what might escape the ears, I freely confess 
that my ignorance was quite as dense at the conclusion 
as at the commencement of the argument. Nay, that 
the idea, in a very unwelcome shape, began to traverse 
my brain, that my learned brethren were just about as 
ignorant as myself. 
It would take no great investigation into our gardening 
literature, letting alone the conversations of the select 
coteries, to show how diverse are the facts and principles 
dame Nature is made to carry on ; her beck, her authority, 
being pronounced as something at which objection should 
be thoroughly hushed, even though the good old lady 
should find a difficulty in discovering a trace of herself in 
the strange garbs in which she w T as arrayed. Homo of 
the most splendid outbursts of eloquence, based on illus¬ 
trations from vegetable nature, lose much of their force 
when it is known that the facts of the illustration, though 
they may be popularly current, are not really true. A 
medical man, who passed w ith high honours a botanical 
examination many years before, was attempting to explain 
what was amiss in the system of an old gardener, by an 
illustration from vegetable structure; when the old man, 
bad as he was, laughed outright at finding his good friend 
so floundering out of his depth: and the good doctor, 
with equal hilarity, confessed that he was thoroughly 
crammed for his examination, and had had no time to 
think of it since. He added : “ I must mind your cor¬ 
rection ; for, unfortunately, I have used the same sup¬ 
posed natural illustration several times already; and 
thought, because it was so familiar, it would be all the 
more telling.” 
Now, successful gardening will greatly depend on our 
being able to assist nature—to act in unison with, and 
not in opposition to, natural laws. The more careful our 
observation, and consequently the more extended our 
knowledge, the more able shall we be to generalise, and 
form for ourselves general natural principles of action. 
These great general laws, however, if we would not be 
led astray, must not be followed to the neglect of the 
more particular rules, deduced from the vast variety of 
the tribes of vegetation, and the very different circum¬ 
stances in which they are naturally found as respects 
climate, position, &c.; taken in connection with the diffi¬ 
culty—nay, the impossibility—of giving to many such 
plants in our climate advantages such as they possessed 
in their own homes; because, though wealth may here 
command the heat of the tropics, it cannot command the 
bright unclouded sunlight of these regions. 
The very artificial circumstances in which plants are 
thus often placed, and our desire to make the most of 
the flowers when we get them, render it quite natural 
and right to follow the courses disapproved of by our 
correspondent; though, were it not for the continuance of 
the flowers, it might seem more natural and less intricate 
to follow the plan in many cases which he indicates. 
Thus, though it is hardly worth while to show, that 
in many cases there is more than one growth for the 
season, it is more profitable to recollect, in unison with 
the theory of forcing, before or after bloom, that the 
period of growth as contradistinguished from the period 
of bloom, is regulated by no general law. In many cases 
we have the bloom before there is a vestige of foliage ; 
and, in that case, leaf-growth, and wood, or bulb-ripening, 
must succeed flowering. In other cases, we have bloom 
on the Young wood of the current year; and in that case 
there must be growth before there can be bloom; and 
that growth again must be matured, to emit other young 
flowering shoots in a following year. Not to enlarge : in 
the three plants named by our correspondent, the flower- 
buds are formed at the points of last year’s well-ripened 
shoots, that ripeness being of as much importance as 
mere growth. In their natural homes, these plants would 
bloom and grow contemporaneously ; and so they would 
do here, if each had a house suitable to itself: for, although 
our correspondent has placed them together, they will 
not thrive under the same treatment. But then we like 
the flowers so well, that to keep them as long as possible, 
we place the plants in a lower temperature. That of 
itself checks growth; and, if long continued, is apt to 
injure the plant. It is not so good for the plant as if it 
were allowed to remain in the temperature in which it 
came into bloom, and to go on without that hindrance. 
The encouraging the plant after blooming is, therefore, 
merely attempting to make up the lee-w ay, and to give to 
it what Nature would have given if it had not been 
interfered with. 
Besides, so liable are many plants to suffer from this 
check, and to meet with careless treatment when out of 
bloom—the bloom being all the attraction—that in very 
many cases, such as the Daphne, it has been proved to 
be the best practice to encourage the w'ood-making and 
ripening by extra attention; and then let the bloom come 
naturally, without any extra heat beyond a greenhouse 
or conservatory. The latter, in general, being from 5° to 
10° higher in temperature in winter than a cool green¬ 
house. In such a place, Camellias and Daphnes w ould 
bloom all the winter. 
However well, then, many plants would thrive when 
kept all the year round in such a house, it is not for such 
a house that precise and particular directions for plants 
are given, so much as for houses intended to be kept as 
gay as possible, by admitting flowering-plants, and re¬ 
moving those, or shifting them when done flowering. 
Of course, where conveniences do not exist, such fine 
things as Pleromas must find a suitable place in the one 
house. Camellias and Azaleas, and even Daphnes would 
do as well without moving as with, if they got the neces¬ 
sary treatment; but then no other plants could stand in 
the same place. Our impression is, that whether kept in 
the house, or taken from it, so that the plants at one time 
have a higher temperature and a moister atmosphere, and 
then at another time more air and more light than they 
could receive in a common house, and, perhaps, consider¬ 
ably darkened by creepers, the nearer the minute 
directions can be acted upon, the greater will be the 
general success ; though 1 should not by any means even 
then guarantee against deaths and losses, for these will 
happen among plants, as well as among men, with small 
note of warning at times. 
I will now glance at a few particulars. Having in 
