242 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
March 25, 1905. 
supports. Sowing the seed in colours, I may say individually, 
commends itself to have access to cut a special kind, and must, 
for exhibition facilities, be employed. Prinaa Donna (pink), 
Miss Wilbnott (orange-pink), Lady Grizel Hamilton (lavender), 
Lord Rosebery (magentamose), Navy Blue, America (red, 
striped) are typical Sweet Peas. 
What is more attractive and useful than a good display of 
mixed Sweet Peas, especially where a mania for cut flowers 
reigns? With the exception of Sweet Peas, the hardy section 
can be all sown with but slight differences in covering the seed. 
Fork over the ground to be sown, use a wooden rake to make 
a fine tilth—in no case use a steel rake, for it makes the soil 
too fine, and the result is a hard surface—after the first shower 
of rain. The seed germinates, but has not strength to pierce 
the baked surface. Large patches have most effect. 
Very shallow lines, if that is adopted, covering the seed with 
some 'finely sifted soil, will be found a good criterion, as the 
covering of seed is an initial error. No success will accrue 
from a haphazard and unpractical plan of seed sowing where 
a border is honoured to be an annual one. Sowing in beds 
and working the wooden rake over the border as a covering is 
the plan of a very successful exhibitor of his favourite annuals. 
A Selection of Annuals. — In making this I will append a 
list of fifteen, which contain three requisite qualities, viz., good 
for exhibition, good for cutting, and thirdly, well adapted for 
massing in flower-borders and elsewhere. Be partial to the 
first six varieties where six alone are to be shown. 
(To be continued .) 
Gardening as an Employment for Women.; 
This craze has now been some years before the public atten¬ 
tion, and, like very many other empty dreams, this one has 
not proved quite tire success which was promised. It is not, 
however, because it was not fully tried and tested, for that, 
it must be confessed, was gone into, perhaps, with more zest 
and determined energy than better and more congenial avoca¬ 
tions. The reason for this is a little complex at first sight, 
but on giving the matter some reflection much of the angu- 
lated nature of the question will be smoothed down and diffi¬ 
culties disappear. The hue and cry to begin with was the 
offspring of a class equipped with plenty of feelings, and armed 
with good intentions no doubt, but they lacked the common 
sense so necessarily requisite for the ordinary matters of 
life. The question of employment for women, to the origina¬ 
tors of the gardening scheme, was the only thing probably 
which they could thoroughly grasp. The employment itself, 
its nature and suitability, was probably as dark a problem 
as the origin of man himself. Then there was, and still is, a 
powerful disposition on the part of advocates of the girl 
gardener to unduly puff up the merits of the calling and 
exaggerate the advantages which will accrue from paying 
sums of money as premiums and for other instruction. Had 
any lady or gentleman less money and more brains, neither 
should ever send a daughter to be a gardener on the slender 
hopes that anything she could acquire theoretically or practi- ' 
cally could possibly gain her a better position than she could 
find in remunerative employments congenial to her sex. 
There is, of course, a way by which a lady gardener may 
possibly rise to eminence. A lady or gentleman may, in a 
moment of enthusiasm, give the situation of head gardener 
to her instead of, as herebefore, to a male gardener; but in 
such a case the benefice was conferred in charity more than 
merit. Some have already tried this, but the experiment has 
seriously failed, and they are now wise at the cost of their 
generosity. To ladies, I should say in the way of serious 
advice, if they contemplate gardening as an occupation, not 
to have anything to do with sc precarious, unsuitable, and 
uncongenial a callin'?. You never can hope to achieve any¬ 
thing worth fighting for, and even did your talents bring you 
higher up in the scale than the average male, why, you are 
then fitted for a superior place in the sphere of worthy em- 
ployment for women in Government service or many others, 
and withal far superior remuneration. " D. C. 
Year-old Runners for Strawberry Forcing. 
It probably happens with many gardeners when planting- out 
plots of Strawberries in spring from autumn-secured runners 
that they have a number of plants left over when planting D 
finished, which are usually thrown on the rubbish heap, except, 
maybe, a few which are laid in some corner to make good any 
deaths which may occur. Where Strawberry forcing is earned 
on, instead of throwing away these young plants, they should 
be potted up and utilised for early work the following season, 
unless the sorts are such as are not adapted for this purpose. 
Notwithstanding that many experienced men deprecate the use 
of these one-year-old plants for the pux-pose named, in my own 
experience I have found them to be quite equal to, and indeed 
often give better results than, plants secured under what we 
might term the orthodox method. 
Some years ago, after planting out a new plot of Garibaldi 
Strawberry; I found I had over a hundred fine, well-rooted 
plants left, and these I decided to test as to their value for 
forcing the following spring. The plants were allowed to re¬ 
main in the nursery lines until they were showing their flower- 
trusses, when they were carefully lifted, flowers and any points 
of runners showing picked off, and placed in 6-in. pots. The 
soil used was good sound loam, cut from old pasture land the 
preceding year, with a 6-in. potful of soot, the same of bone- 
meal and lime rubbish passed through J-in. riddle to each 
barrowload of loam. A small handful of soot and bone-meal 
was put over the drainage in each pot, the potting stick was 
used for ramming, and a good soaking of water given through 
a rose. 
The pots were set behind a north wall for a time until root 
and top got fairly on the move, then set in the full sun on a 
hard, ash-covered bottom, and likewise bedded to the rim 
amongst ashes. Runners were kept off, and watering carefullv 
seen to until the end of autumn, when the pots were set in a 
cold frame, packed, and crowns lightly covered with diy Beech 
leaves. When wanted for forcing about the end of January, 
eveiy pot was found to be packed with roots, so much so that 
about 20 per cent, of tire pots were burst asunder through pres¬ 
sure of roots, and there was some difficulty in getting these 
plants into other pots of the same size. Some of the surface 
soil was removed from the pots and replaced with fresh loam, 
enriched with a sixth part of an artificial fertiliser, a good 
watering given, and the pots set into heat. Subjected to the 
ordinary routine of forcing, each plant in due course threw up 
from four to seven strong trusses of bloom, which opened and 
set well, only requiring four or five of the best fruits on each 
to be retained to constitute a good crop. 
For size and colour they were all one could wish for from 
forced plants, and I was so well satisfied with the results that 
I have never since used any other method of obtaining plants 
for forcing. The use of these autumn-lifted runners renders 
the carrying of pots of soil to and from the- fruiting quarters 
quite unnecessary, and this usually requires to be done at a 
busy season. Then, by leaving the plants in their winter 
quarters until they show flower, the risk of potting up blind 
plants is entirely eliminated, while the risk of overwateriug 
these plants when once they get started to grow may be said 
to be non-existent. G. F. 
Dendrobium Nobile Purity. 
The ground colour of this fine variety of one of the most 
popular species is pure white. Tire only colour upon it con¬ 
sists of a small rosy-purple blotch at the tips of the sepals 
and petals. The lip is also very beautiful, the ground colour 
being equally pure, with a very small blotch at the tip; on 
the- other hand, tire- blotch at the base comes out with remark¬ 
able distinctness owing to its being of intense blackish-maroon 
colour. Although not differing in any way in form, tire variety 
is a very choice one on account of the distinct contrast of 
colours brought about by the- purity of the ground colour. 
We noted it in the collection of Messrs. J. Cypher and Sons, 
Queen’s Road, Cheltenham. 
