476 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. {1 Junx, 1898. 
About 4,000 to 5,000 plants go to the acre, according to spacing, which is 
more or less a matter of opinion. Generally speaking, the plants are not placed 
closer than 8 feet each way. 
Plants should be raised f 
allowed to flower too scon. 
Lavender likes a temperate climate and a sunny situation, also a deep, 
loamy, friable soil. Cuttings may be struck from, say, March to August or 
September in the Southern parts of the colony, under favourable conditions. 
Rooted plants may be transplanted as late as August, aud will probably 
come into bloom by the end of November. 
Lavandula vera, the only kind worth cultivating, is very difficult to 
procure in Queensland. 
One hundredweight of lavender wili return about 2 1b. weight of oil, but 
the quantity of this, as of all essential oils, will fluctuate with the seasons. 
‘The returns per acre are very hard to arrive at, opinions on the subject 
differing to a great extent. 
Tt has been stated that an acre of lavender will return about 50 Ib. 
of oil, valued at anything from 20s. to 60s. per lb. This seems rather too 
much, but there is no doubt it is a profitable crop, provided it can be produced 
free from camphor. 
Lavender is distilled in the ordinary way with water. The process is 
simple enough, and merely requires care, a little watchfulness, and the exercise 
of common sense. 
To increase the size of the flowers and generally improve the appearance 
of the plant, superphosphate of lime is often used with sood effect. 
rom cuttings, not from seed, and should not be 
PANSIES. 
Now is the season for planting out pansies. What can be more beautiful than 
a bed of well-selected, well-cultivated pansies, or, as we used to eall them in 
the old country, “ Heartsease.”” Much money is made out of pansy-growing in 
the European countries and in the United States of America, and principally 
by women and children. The work is anything but laborious, and the result 
of careful cultivation is as pleasing to the eye as it is profitable to the pocket. 
Tf your garden happens to be situated near scrubs or forests where leaf-mould 
ean be obtained, make a mixture in the proportion of one-half leaf mould, 
one-quarter of old well-sifted manure, one-eighth wood-ashes or soot, and the 
last eighth garden soil. Make a bed of this, and leave it fora week, atter. 
which you may plant out your seedlings, a foot apart each way. The soil thus 
made should be light and rich, and it should be loosened round the plants 
oceasionally. Water should be freely given during the evening when required. 
When the pansies are in bloom, it is well to cut off the dead or dying flowers 
as in the case of dianthus, and thus a continuance of bloom can be ensured. 
A farmer in Florida grows nothing but pansies in his garden. He has a 
bed only 30 feet long and 8 feet wide full of fine pansy plants. He saves 
much of the best seed from choice plants only, and froin this little bed he has 
for years made some 40 dollars ina season. He sells his plants packed in 
earth in grape baskets for from 1 cent a plant to 25 cents a dozen. 
Now, this little flower bed would be a mere pastime to cultivate, whilst it 
would bring in a few pounds every year by the sale of the plants and flowers. 
Last year we planted out some dianthus plants, and they have remained in 
bloom ever since, about fourteen months, All that has been done to them has 
been to loosen the soil, water them, and cut away the dead flower stalks. The 
blooms indeed are finer now than at first. Try a little flower gardening for 
profit. : 
