362 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, March 15, 1869. 
lieat of the sweet, fermented manure escaping in summer, 
and prevent the frost easily going through the wall in 
winter. In very severe weather it may want a mat, or a 
little straight straw, neatly tied along the outside. Of 
course, the glass must be protected in all frosty weather. 
In building the walls, place a row of bricks—say at 
fifteen inches from the desired height in front—so that 
they shall stand beyond the perpendicular, inside, one inch 
and a half or two inches Do the same at the back, in the 
same parallel row of bricks. You will thus have a ledge, 
both back and front, on which to rest strong planks or 
slabs, so as to form a platform for your winter plants. 
You might have a second ledge eight inches deeper, to be 
used for taller plants. The bottom of the pit would furnish 
a third platform. So that you could have three sizes of 
plants in the same pit, though, of course, only one size 
chiefly in one place. Provided you had three strong 
cross bearers beneath each light resting on these ledges, 
you might have small sloping stages made, so as to keep 
the plants near the glass, and you could sink them as they 
required it. Of course, all these would be removed as 
soon as you put in your fermenting matter, a depth of 
two feet at front, and more at back, for the Melons, &c. 
I allude to these ledges for supporting platforms and 
stages to slope with the glass, because a good deal of 
success in keeping bedding plants in winter, in such an 
unheated place, will depend upon them. Many, to avoid 
all such trouble, allow the earth in which the Melons 
grow to get dry and sweet, cover that with dry ashes, 
and, provided they spill no water, and use none except 
what is necessary, imagine they will be free from the 
great enemy in such circumstauces — damp. But if 
there is a long period of dull, foggy weather, or if, in 
severe frost, the lights must be much covered, and but 
little air given, the moisture contained in the soil 
and dung will be sure to get up, and help to keep the 
plants in a vapour-bath. This, to a great extent, will 
be avoided if earth and dung are removed sometime 
before the plants are replaced, the pit well aired and 
dried, and the bottom covered with the driest ashes, after 
the walls have been cleaned and whitewashed with quick 
lime. This is not the only advantage in staging, or plat¬ 
forming. Place your plants on the raised bed of soil, &c., 
and your pit contains but about half the amount of air 
it would do when emptied to the bottom. That air, there¬ 
fore, is more quickly heated by sun, and cooled by frost, 
than if its volume had been much greater. By using a 
platform, your plants will not be excited to grow by sun 
heat in winter so much ; and they will often endure a 
slight frost uninjured, which would have nipped those 
standing near the glass, and no air below the pots. Of 
course, in all such pits, the paths round them should be 
firm, and slope considerably from the walls, so as to throw 
from them all the surface water. Dryness in winter is 
the first consideration. 
II. Modifications of such a pit—to be artificially heated. 
1. To have early Melons without any assistance from the 
heat from decomposing mauurial matter. In such a case, 
the ledges for platforms would not be needed so much. 
A suitable boiler had better be provided. Two three- 
inch pipes would be required for bottom heat, and two of 
the same size for top heat. The bottom of the pit should 
be concreted, and hollowed to the centre like a shallow 
basin; a little thin cement might be run along the top. 
This, if well done, will hold sufficient water to secure a 
moist heat when required. The pipes may be placed 
within half an inch of this concrete, and be packed all 
round, to the depth of a foot or eighteen inches, as hollow 
as possible, with brickbats, clinkers, stones, &c.; termi¬ 
nating at the top with a layer of coarse, and then fine, 
gravel, on which the soil will be placed. No bottom heat 
will be wanted for the plants in winter, if bedding, or 
ordinary greenhouse, plants are used. 2. Where ma- 
nurial decomposing matter will be used for bottom heat, 
and two pipes for top heat, when required in summer, 
and for keeping out frost in w inter. The position of the 
pipes will matter but little, w hether near the bottom or the 
top of the front Wall of the pit, provided they arc not shut 
in. 3. Where dung and leaves will be used for bettora 
heat, and two pipes allowed to assist top and bottom heat 
in summer, and keep out the frost and give motion to the 
internal air in winter. In this case, two pipes—if four- 
inch all the better—should be fixed near the bottom of 
the pit, and pretty closely to the front wall. A wall of 
brick on edge, or a thin moveable partition of wood, 
should shut in this small space where the pipes are from 
the pit; the fence, or line of partition, rising rather higher 
than the soil in the pit is likely to be. Communicating 
with this open chamber, an open drain should cross from 
the front to the back of the pit, every four feet, formed 
of earthenware pipes, or bricks, or other heat-conducting 
matter, and communicating with the atmosphere of the 
pit by means of open, round, earthenware pipes, standing 
against the back wall, and higher than the soil is likely to 
be. By these means, wdienever the pipes are heated, there 
will be'a circulation of air. The air in the open chamber 
in front will be expanded, rise, and pass over the bed and 
its crop, and fall, as it cools, to the open drains at the 
back ; and, passing through the cross-covered drain, supply 
the place of the heated expanded air in the small enclosed 
space. The fermenting matter w ill be placed over and 
between these cross drains. Then, in summer, when the 
bottom heat may have declined too much, we have only to 
choose a sunny day, w hen top heat is not wanted, heat 
the pipes—but cover the small cavity along the front 
above the pipes with narrow boards made to fit, or other 
means—and insert a plug in the upright pipes at the back ; 
and the heat from the pipes, instead of heating the atmo¬ 
sphere, will be forced to exert itself in warming the cross 
drains, and, through them, influence the heat of the 
dung and soil. 
III. It might be very troublesome to get rid of water, 
| if the pit should be partly sunk. In that case, it may be 
’ all above the ground level; but, if heated inside by manure, 
1 rather more depth will be required, and more attention 
to protecting the walls in winter, unless tire heat, in some 
mode, be used. A flue is not quite so good as a pipe. Iu 
such pits, managed almost entirely from the outside, high 
walls are very unpleasant to work from ; but that is much 
less an evil than being troubled with water. That is also 
one reason why we confine the width to about six feet, 
as the centre may lie reached without often placing the 
foot inside. 
IY. Where plants are’to be kept in winter, and early 
Melons procured with the help of dung alone, in unison 
with general neatness. In such a case, sweet fer¬ 
mented material must generally be placed inside, with 
drain tiles through it, or open faggots, to be kept open, 
and acted upon afterwards, by linings round the sides ; 
these linings neatly covered with shutter boards to keep 
all out of sight, and sloping outwards from the wall. 
There are various modes of getting the linings to act 
on the interior. Some have pigeon-holed, nine-inch, 
or four-and-a-half-inch walls, below the level of the 
linings. If four-and-a-half inch w'alls, nine-inch pieces 
are placed every eight feet or so. These pigeon-hole 
openings act in unison, or independently of cross drains 
in the bed. When used thus simply, care must be 
i taken that the earth, &c., inside are nine inches or so 
higher than the pigeon-holes, and are made firm, and 
closely pressed to the walls; otherwise, the steam from 
rank dung passing through would destroy the plants. 
! Some, to remedy this, sweeten the dung before using 
it for linings ; but this involves much labour. By this 
process, the artificial heat you get in the atmosphere of the 
pit must pass through the soil. To secure top heat as 
well, some have a lining of slate inside the pigeon holes, 
and separated two or three inches from the inner wall, 
and rising to near the height of the walls, so as to let the 
heat from the linings up to heat the air in the house. 
