THE LADIES’ FLORAL CABINET. 
129 
Double-flowering Cineraria. 
months that they are in season, and in the latter they are 
capable of being bloomed in the greatest profusion. 
Their exceedingly bright colors make them useful con¬ 
servatory decorative plants, and for natural arrangement 
of cut-flowers they have but few equals. At one time 
good forms of pleasing colors were comparatively scarce, 
and the best kinds were named and 
propagated from root-suckers taken off 
and placed singly in small pots ; these, 
when shaded, well supplied with moist¬ 
ure and kept a little close, soon got 
established. Now, when there is so 
much general improvement, the usual 
method is to raise the plants annually 
from seeds and to throw away, as soon 
as they are done flowering, all except 
the very best specimens, which should 
be allowed to mature their seed. 
The cineraria is not easily forced, 
therefore the seeds should be sown 
sufficiently early for the plants to get 
large enough and well matured, so that 
they may flower naturally, without be¬ 
ing hurried. The seeds should be sown 
from the first of April to the first of 
June, in order to keep up a succession 
of good flowering plants. Sow in well- 
drained pans. The soil should be good 
free loam and leaf-mould, of which 
these plants are particularly fond, with 
a slight mixture of fine sand ; fill the 
pans within an inch of the rim, pressing 
it moderately firm ; water with a rose 
so as to settle the whole, and sow the 
seeds thinly, in order that the young plants may have suffi¬ 
cient room to prevent their roots from getting crowded, in 
which case they are liable to injury in transplanting; cover 
the seeds thinly with light soil, and press the surface firm. 
Place the pans where the sun will not come upon them, 
and do not water more than is requisite before the plants 
are up. After they have vegetated keep moderately moist 
and put them where they will get plenty of light but little 
sun ; when large enough to handle, prick them out in pans 
or pots filled with soil similar to that in which they were 
sown, excepting that now sand may be dispensed with. 
When the seedlings have grown so as to touch each other 
they should be placed singly in four-inch pots, using such 
soil as that in which they were pricked out, as there is none 
more suitable to the succeeding stages of their growth. 
They should now be moved into shallow frames facing the 
north, and if on the shady side of a building, so much the 
better. If the frames are so situated that the sun in the 
middle of the day shines upon the plants, they must be 
slightly shaded. Give plenty of air, and from their first 
appearance above ground never allow them to get dry. 
When the pots get filled with 'roots, larger ones must at 
once be substituted ; if this is delayed until the plants are 
at all stunted, or form flower-stems, very little good will 
be effected by giving more room, as they will not increase 
much in size afterward. For most purposes six-inch pots 
are large enough, if the plants are well attended to and 
liberally supplied with manure-water as their blooming- 
pots get filled with roots. Pot moderately firm, place 
them again in a similar situation, and all they will require 
during the remainder of the summer will be to keep them 
regularly attended to with water, air, and, as heretofore, 
shaded slightly from the mid-day sun, the bed of ashes on 
Perfection Cineraria in Full Flower. 
