THE CULTURE OF ALPINE PLANTS 
75 
It is important to keep this in mind, as weak plants seem to be especially liable to die down in this 
manner, and are often thrown out as dead. The inexperienced grower is apt to deluge his plants with 
water, when he sees them exhibit a tendency to lose their leaves. This is the very worst thing that 
can be done; water must be withheld as much as possible, and it is a difficult matter indeed to kill 
Primulas bv drought in the winter. 
Primulas are readily propagated by division of the roots immediately after spring flowering, or in 
autumn. They ought not to be disturbed in early spring. The young plants should not be allowed to 
flower for some time, as it weakens them; and all autumn flowering, of even well-established plants, 
ought to be guarded against. They may also be propagated by seeds; many of the species produce 
these freely, and they all come truer from seeds than our wild Cowslips, Oxlips, and Primroses, which 
would seem to be all capable of being raised from the seeds of one another. 
Few Alpine plants are better adapted than the genus Primula for cultivation amid the smoke of a 
city. Outside the window at which these remarks are penned, Primula scotica and P. farinosa are 
spreading out their leaves as robustly, and pushing up their flower stems as freely, as they did in their 
native wilds, whence they were removed not two years ago. More through accident than design, the 
soil in the seed-pan which contained them was allowed to get completely dry throughout the winter. 
No sooner was water applied in March, than they, along with Saxifraga hirta, pushed forth vigorously. 
One of the most recent additions to the genus Primula is P. sikkimensis, which we owe to the 
labours of the indefatigable Dr. Hooker in Sikkim-Himalaya. He styles it “ the pride of all the Alpine 
Primulas, inhabiting wet boggy places, at elevations of from 12 to 17,000 feet, at Lachen and Lachlong, 
covering acres with a yellow carpet in May and June.” Sir William Hooker, in the Botanical Magazine 
(t. 4597), describes it as the tallest Primula in cultivation, and very different from any species hitherto 
described. It may possibly prove quite hardy and suitable for the herbaceous border ; but it will for 
many years be too rare and interesting a beauty to be regarded otherwise than as a first-rate Alpine. 
Mr. Smith styles it as a “free growing” species. With us it died down to the ground last winter, and 
revived again with the genial warmth of April. 
In a genus like the present, where every species is an object of beauty and interest in the eyes of 
the cultivator, it is difficult to make a selection of what the nurserymen call “ approved sorts.” Setting 
aside the whole race of florists’ Primulas (Auriculas, Polyanthuses, and Double Primroses), together 
with those suitable for flower-border decoration, we enumerate twenty kinds well worthy of attention, 
and which will be found to exhibit the leading features of form and colour belonging to this attractive 
family. Those marked with an asterisk are particularly interesting :— 
* P. capitata. 
P. ciliata purpurata. 
P. cortusoid.es. 
* P. denticulata. 
P. elatior caerulea. 
P. farinosa. 
P. farinosa alba. 
P. helvetica. 
P. hirsuta. 
P. integrifolia. 
e P. involucrata. 
P. marginata major. 
P. minima. 
* P. Munroi. 
P. nivalis. 
P. pusilla. 
P. scotica. 
P. sibirica. 
* P. sikkimensis. 
* P. Stuartii. 
In recommending the plants to be at once potted in large-sized pots, we would not be understood 
to advocate a practice having a tendency to render facilities of thorough drainage less perfect. Drainage 
is a vital point in the cultivation of these plants, and it ought to be kept in view that the larger the 
pot is, the greater the necessity for good drainage. These, like most other Alpine plants, do well in 
shallow pots, the value of which in horticulture generally is too little known. They allow of the free 
horizontal development of the roots, which is decidedly more natural than that allowed of by the pots 
usually in use. Depth is not necessary for most plants, but the free spread of their rootlets is essential 
for their well-being. It is not to be expected that a plant can continue in healthy vital action when its 
rootlets are concentrated at one point within the narrow bottom of a flower-pot, an occurrence which 
the pot, in its usual form, is certainly peculiarly well fitted to induce.—G. 
