69 
IMPROVEMENT IN GARDEN POTS. 
We remark with much satisfaction that some of our contem¬ 
poraries have touched upon this subject lately, because when 
public attention is directed in a proper manner to an existing' 
evil, improvement is soon effected. Every person engaged in 
the cultivation of plants, is aware of the great influence of good 
or bad pots on the roots of plants, and that a great defect does 
exist in the manner of draining those in general use; so that 
any method professing to improve this important point should 
receive the support of those interested, until it again can be 
improved. 
Mr. Paxton, in the last Number of his Magazine of Botany, 
has suggested that six or seven holes be made in the bottom of 
each pot (the number to be regulated by the size of the pot), in 
preference to the single hole now in general use. These addi¬ 
tional apertures would greatly assist the drainage, and also ad¬ 
mit a more perfect circulation of air through the earth contained 
in the pots. This alone is of sufficient importance, from the 
beneficial effect it must have on the sod in preserving it in a 
sweet and proper state, to insure the application wherever 
known. And that the roots may receive the influence of the sun, 
so necessary to the proper development of both flowers and fruit, 
it is advised that the pots be made wider and more shallow than 
is their present form. And as a further means of facilitating the 
drainage, it is proposed that the pots should be furnished with 
feet, by continuing the sides of the pot about an inch below the 
bottom, this rim to be divided into segments. The object of this 
is to elevate the bottom of the pot from the stage on which it 
stands, so as to allow all superfluous water to pass off at once. 
The value of this will be seen immediately, by every one conver¬ 
sant with the subject; and this latter idea has been caught at, 
as we perceive from another source, and actually patented, by a 
Mr. Hunt, of Pimlico. 
Now as we are always anxious that the proper reward of merit 
should be assigned to its legitimate possessor, and desirous also 
that the interests of Horticulture be kept free from the tram¬ 
mels arising from sordid reasons—in short, wishing every cul¬ 
tivator to enjoy the advantage of this improvement—we have 
taken the trouble to turn over the leaves of our second volume, 
