SOME REMARKS ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE GENUS CALCEOLARIA.

By the Editor.

THE species are mostly natives of Chili and Peru; one only, C. Fothergilli, having been found upon the Falkland Islands. C. pinnata and Fothergilli were introduced into England as early as 1777, but none of the other species until 1822; when C. rugosa, integrifolia, and one or two others, were added. They are all beautiful, though C. pinnata is a small annual species. C. rugosa and integrifolia, common in our greenhouses, are among the most brilliant of the shrubby species. C. corymbosa, a fine herbaceous species, is the parent of many of the finest varieties.

Within a few years, hundreds of varieties have been raised by intermixture of the different species; and they will, no doubt, soon become as numerous as the much admired dahlia or geranium, and the desire to possess new kinds seems, also, to be nearly as great. It was not until the introduction of a purple species, C. purpùrea, in 1827, that any variation took place in the colour of the flowers; the previously introduced ones being yellow, of course no other shade was produced until the impregnation of the former with the latter. At the present time, however, plants are to be found of almost every tint, from the palest yellow to deep orange, and from light red to bright scarlet; as also, two or three of these shades distinct in the same flower. Various fanciful names have been given to the different varieties, that they may be more easily distinguished, and to serve as a guide for the amateur or gentleman to select from the nurseryman, kinds, which, by their name and beauty, have become known as possessing extraordinary splendour.

Calceolarias are extremely difficult to import, and hence we must look to our own gardens for an increase of fine varieties. With the two colours of the different species, purple and yellow, which are now in our gardens, we can as easily produce fine seedlings as our Continental neighbours, no uncommon care is requisite, and as they soon show what they are, the cultivator need possess but a small share of patience. The second season, after sowing the seed, the plants flower, and such as are worthy of preserving should be named, and the others thrown away. It would not be judicious to save a kind, of which there already exists several superior ones.

We had last season in full bloom several plants which we raised from seeds sown the previous year. Having succeeded tolerably well in our mode of culture, a few remarks we have thought would not be unappropriate at this time, and, perhaps, call more attention to this fine family. Seeds are procured from any of the species or varieties by dusting the pollen on the stigma att he time they are in bloom. Two distinct colours, impregnated together, would be more likely to produce beautiful new kinds than two very similar ones. When the seed is ripe, it should be immediately sown in pots, filled with a com. post of sandy loam and leaf mould broken up very fine or MAGAZINE OF BOTANY AND GARDENING, VOL. III. NO.

sifted. The seeds are exceedingly small, and will not vegetate in a coarse soil. Cover them very thinly with the compost, barely sufficient to permit the sun and air from drying the seeds too much, and place the pot in a rather shady place, and keep it well watered; giving, however, but little at a time through a watering pot with a very fine rose, or else the seeds will be all washed away. In the course of three weeks, or a month, the young plants will make their appearance above the soil. When they have two rough leaves, they should be potted off into small pots (number one's) in the same compost in which the seeds were sown, and placed away in a shady situation. It frequently happens that all the seeds do not come up at one time; when this is the case, the largest plants should be taken out very carefully with a small sharp pointed stick, or with a knife, so as not to disturb the soil more than possible; in this way proceed until all the plants which may appear during the summer, are potted off. During the season no particular care is necessary but to keep them duly watered and shaded partially from the sun; they should also be placed where the worms cannot enter the pots.

Upon the approach of cold weather they should be removed into the green-house with the other plants. Place them upon a dry shelf, where they will receive the benefit of the light and air, as they are impatient of a confined atmosphere; water them occasionally as they may require, which in the winter season is generally about twice a week; if any of the plants, which were first potted, have grown to a tolerably strong size when they are put into the green-house, they should be shifted into number two pots. No other care is requisite until they begin to grow in the month of February.

As soon as the plants show signs of growing, in the spring, they should be frequently looked at and supplied more freely with water. A compost should also then be prepared to re-pot the plants in; for this purpose, one recommended for sowing the seeds in, but richer, will do very well for the herbaceous kinds, and may be mixed together as follows:-one half well decomposed hot-bed manure, one quarter light loam, and one quarter composed of leaf-mould and sand, in equal parts. Making use of this soil, the plants should be re-potted as often as they require it, until they begin to open their blossoms, the final shifting being generally into number six pots, or those measuring eight inches across,-always remembering to give a good drainage to the pots by placing over the hole plenty of potsherds. When they are in flower, give them moderate supplies of water. The flower stems should be tied up to sticks as they advance, to prevent their growing crooked. When they are in full flower, give attention to the fertilizing of the blossoms and saving of the seed, and afterwards cut away the decayed stems. Many of the herbaceous species will flower all summer if turned into the open border, for which purpose the poorer seedlings answer very well.

The shrubby species and varieties require a somewhat different soil from the herbaceous ones; it may be mixed of X, OCTOBER, 1837.

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equal parts well decomposed manure or leaf mould and loam, adding a small portion of sand. The herbaceous kinds are propagated by division of the root, and the shrubby ones by cuttings. Soon after the former have done flowering, separate the old roots, potting them into small pots and placing in a rather shady situation, as recommended for the seedlings. Cuttings of the shrubby ones may be put in at almost any season of the year, in a light soil, composed of loam and leaf mould; but the best time is just before, or soon after, they have done blooming; the young plants will then get strong before winter, and will flower more vigorously the next season. Put ten or twelve cuttings in a pot, and place it in a shady situation, where they will root in a fortnight or three weeks, and should then be potted off singly into small sized pots.

C. corymbosa and péndula are beautiful herbaceous species, and the hybrid varieties are all elegant; C. integrifolia, rugosa and arachnoida, with the hybrid varieties, are splendid shrubby ones. The latter are scarcely more than bienuial, and should be annually propagated from cuttings.

ON THE CAMELLIA.

THE Camellia Japonica (common Camellia) is of free growth, and in China is said to attain the height of one of our cherry trees. The stem is erect and branching, of a pale brown colour. The bark is ash coloured. Branches round, smooth, and clothed with numerous alternate, thick dark green leaves, shining on both sides; each leaf is about three inches long, and two inches broad. The footstalks are about an inch long, quite smooth, and slightly channelled on the upper side, and of the same yellowish-green colour as the mid-rib. Flowerbuds oval, and much pointed covered with seven or eight pale green roundish cordate scales, which generally become brown, and drop when the flower is fully expanded.

From this species has originated nearly the whole of the double varieties. Being of free growth, and easily increased by cuttings, it is of great value to the cultivator, as it affords an excellent stock whereon to inarch or graft the other Camellias, for which purpose it is extensively cultivated in the neighbourhood of London. It is held in high esteem with the Japonese for the elegance of its large flowers, which exhibit a great variety of colours, but have no scent, and for its ever-green leaves. It is very common everywhere in their groves and gardens, flowering from October to April. The single red Camellia is propagated by cuttings, layers, and seeds, for stocks; and on these the other sorts are generally inarched, and sometimes budded or grafted. The cuttings are formed of ripened or ripening shoots, taken off in August, cut smoothly across at a joint or bud, two or three of the lower leaves only taken off, and the cuttings then planted and made firm with a small dibber, in pans of sand or loam, or by some cultivators, sand and peat, or sand alone. The pans are kept in a pit or cold frame, without being covered with glass, but shaded during powerful sunshine; and in the following spring such as are struck will begin to push, when they are to be placed in a gentle heat. In September or October following, the rooted plants will be fit to pot off; and in the second or third spring they may be used as stocks.

Henderson (gardener to W. F. Campbell, Esq. Woodhall), puts in all sorts of Camellias at any time of the year, excepting when they are making young wood. He puts fifty cuttings in a pot of sand eight inches in diameter, sets them in a cool place in the back of a vinery or peach house, for a month or six weeks, then plunges them to the brim in a hot-bed where is a little bottom heat.

Some cultivators grow the Camellias chiefly in peat. Messrs. Loddiges, who have a most numerous collection of this genus, formerly used loam, with a little sand and peat; and they are grown in a similar soil in Hammersmith nursery. Of late Messrs. Loddiges find light loam alone to answer as

well or better. In the Comte de Vande's garden at Bayswater, rotten dung is mixed with loam and peat. Sweet recommends sandy loam and peat. Henderson, of Woodhall, is one of the most successful growers of the Camellia in Scotland; his compost is as follows: take one part of light brown mould, one part of river-sand, one part of peat earth, one half part rotten leaves; mix them all well together, and when the Camellias require shifting, put some broken coalchar in the bottom of the pots, and some dry moss or hypnum over it. Messrs. Chandler and Sons, of the Wandsworth Road, who have by far the most extensive collection about London, and may be truly said to have done more for Camellias in ten years than the Chinese have done from the beginning of the world, consider a strong, rich, yellow loam, as the best soil to cultivate them in.

Camellias have the best effect and are grown to most advantage in a house entirely devoted to them. Such a house should be rather lofty, as the plants never look so well as when six or eight feet high, trained in a conic form, and clothed with branches from the root upwards. The plants should be raised near to the glass by means of a stage, which should be so contrived, that, as they advance in height, it may be lowered in proportion: only the very best crown or patent glass should be used; because it is found from experience, that the least inequality of surface or thickness of material, so operates on the sun's rays, as to concentrate them, and burn or produce blotches on the leaves of the plants. Every cultivator must have observed that leathery shining leaves, like those of the orange, myrtle, &c., are more or less subject to this solar injury; but the leaves of the Camellia are particularly so. Some nurserymen recommend a roof which will not admit much light; others the use of green glass; of an opaque roof with glass in front only; or of a house facing the north. Our opinion is, that a light house facing the south, or, better still, glass on all sides, is essential to the perfect growth of the plants; and that all solar accidents may be avoided, or at least rendered of no consequence, by using the best glass, and placing the plants as near it as possible.

To grow the Camellia to a high degree of perfection, considerable care is requisite. The roots are very apt to get matted in the pot, and, by the space they occupy, so to compress the ball of mould, as after a time to render it impervious to the water. Hence frequent attention should be had, to see that the water poured on the pots moistens all the earth, and does not escape by the sides of the pot, moistening only the web of fibres. When the plants are in flower and in a growing state, they require to be liberally watered, and also a degree of heat somewhat greater than is usually given to greenhouse plants. If this heat is not given in November and December, the plants will not expand their blossoms freely; and if both water and heat are not regularly applied after the blossoming seasons, vigorous shoots and flower-buds will not be produced. To form handsome plants they should be trained with single stems to rods, and pruned so as to make them throw out side branches from every part of the stem: to encourage these, the plants should not be set close together on the stage. In summer they may either be set out of doors on a stratum of scoriæ, or on a pavement, in a sheltered but open situation; or the glass roof may be taken off. The hardier sorts, as the double red, blush, pæony-flowered, &c. answer very well when planted in the bed or border of a conservatory, provided the roof or entire superstructure can be removed in summer to admit the full influence of the weather. When this cannot be done, the Camellia and most other plants are better in portable utensils, which admit both of examining their roots and placing them in the open air, or in a greater degree of heat at pleasure. The single and double, red Camellia will endure the open air when trained against a south wall, and protected by mats in winter; and there can be no doubt that in time these and other species will be more perfectly inured to our climate.

Henderson describes his mode of treating the Camellia as follows:-"The best time for a regular shifting of the Camel

lias is the month of February or beginning of March: After shifting all those that require it, put them into the peachhouse or vinery, when there is a little heat; if there be no peach-house, vinery, nor pinery, set them in the warmest part of the greenhouse. They will soon begin to make young wood. From the time they begin to make their young shoots, till they have finished their growth, give them plenty of water. They may be kept in the vinery or peach-house till they have formed their flower-buds at the extremity and sides of the young growths, when a few of them may be removed to a colder place, say behind the stage of the greenhouse; for the Camellias are fond of being shaded during strong sunshine. In three or four weeks after, a few more Camellias may be brought from the vinery or peach-house, and put into a cooler situation. This may be repeated three or four times, which will make as many different successions of flowering. Those that are wanted to come into flower early, may remain in the warm house till they are beginning to flower, when they should be taken to a cold place, say the coldest place of the greenhouse; then give them plenty of light only, and they will open their flowers well, and stand long. A Camellia cannot stand heat when in flower, indeed they seldom open their flowers fine when in heat, and, at all events, the flowers soon fall off. Those that are kept all the summer in the vinery, will come into flower by the first or middle of October, and a pretty large plant, having perhaps fifty or a hundred flowerbuds, will continue in flower till the month of January. Those plants that are removed early from the vinery, will now be in flower, to succeed those that were in October, and have now done flowering. These last should be immediately taken into the heat. They will make their young wood early, and they may remain in heat till they come into flower, which will perhaps be a month earlier next year. By attending to shifting the Camellia plauts from the warm house to the cold, a regular succession of flowers may thus be had from the first of October to the middle of July. I have even had them all the summer, but the flowers are best in the winter. Those produced in summer are far from being so fine, and do not stand half the time of those that come into flower in November, December, January, February, March, and April. Camellias delight to be kept damp all the summer months, and a little shaded from the strong sun. Give them plenty of water while they are making their young shoots; they may also get a gentle sprinkling over the leaves once every week during the summer season, except when they are in flower. Camellias will stand a great deal of cold without being much injured, but they will not form many flower-buds without some artificial heat."

A few seeds are sometimes obtained from the single red and semi-double Camellias, and from the single waratah; these require two years to come up, but make the best stocks of

any.

Before they are grafted they are often allowed to come into flower, in case some new variety should be produced; but the best cultivators, as Messrs. Chandler, Sweet, and Mackay, regularly cross-impregnate the blossoms in Knight's manner, by cutting out the stamens before the anthers are mature, and when the stigma is in a proper state, dusting it with the pollen of the species or variety intended as the male parent.

C. Sasanqua seeds most readily, and is mostly employed as the female parent for raising new varieties. The plants, if well treated, flower in four or five years, and if nothing new is produced they still make excellent stocks.

Messrs. Chandler and Booth, in their first volume of Illustrations and Descriptions of the Camellice, denominate as species Camellia japonica, C. maliflora, C. oleifolia, C. reticulata, C. sasanqua and C. kissi.

As Chinese varieties of C. japonica: Semi-double whiteAnemone-flowered or waratah-Loddiges' red-Middlemist's red-Kent's fringed double white-Crimson shell-floweredLady Hume's blush-Myrtle leaved-Red pæony-floweredPompone-Double red-Captain Rawes's variegated waratah -Double striped-and Captain Wellbank's Camellia.

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Of the English varieties of C. japonica-Single white-Mr. Aiton's-Holy hock flowered-White anemone-floweredChandler's-Chandler's neat coral-coloured-Press's eclipse -Chandler's elegant-Young's semi-double red-Chandler's choice flowered-Cluster flowering-Splendid-Gray's invincible-China rose-) -Ross's-Allnut's-Lady Wilton's-and Wood's Camellia.

Of these the double white, double striped, and double waratah, are considered the grandest and most marked varieties, and are also free growers and flowerers; the pæony-flowered and fringed white, are also standard beauties, but all are much admired.

ON SOWING BROCCOLI.

THE seeds of the broccoli, of which there are several kinds, viz. the Roman, or purple, and the Neapolitan, or white, and the black broccoli, with some others (but the Roman is chiefly preferred to them all), should be sown about the latter end of May, or beginning of June, in a moist soil; and when the plants are grown to have eight leaves, transplant them into beds, and toward the middle of July they will be fit to plant out finally, which should be into some well sheltered spot of ground, but not under the drip of trees; the distance these require is about a foot and a half in the rows, and two feet row from row. The soil in which they should be planted, ought to be rather light than heavy, such as are the kitchen gardens near London: if your plants succeed well (as there will be little reason to doubt, unless the winter prove extremely severe) they will begin to show their small heads, which are somewhat like a cauliflower, but of a purple colour, about the end of December, and will continue eatable till the middle of April.

The brown or black broccoli is by many persons greatly esteemed, though it does not deserve a place in the kitchen garden, where the Roman broccoli can be obtained, which is much sweeter, and will continue longer in season: indeed, the brown sort is much hardier, so that it will thrive in the coldest situations, where the Roman broccoli is sometimes destroyed in very hard winters. The brown sort should be sown in the middle of May, and should be planted about two feet and a half asunder. This will grow very tall, and should have the earth drawn up to the stems as it advances in height. This does not form heads so perfect as the Roman broccoli; the stems and hearts of the plants are the parts

which are eaten.

The Roman broccoli (if well managed) will have large heads, which appear in the centre of the plants, like clusters of buds. These heads should be cut before they run up to seed, with about four or five inches of the stem; the skin of these stems should be stripped off before they are boiled: these will be very tender and little inferior to asparagus. After the first heads are cut off, there will be a great number of side shoots produced from the stems, which will have small heads to them, but are full as well flavoured as the large. These shoots will continue good until the middle of April, when the asparagus will come in plenty to supply the table.

The Naples broccoli has white heads, very like those of the cauliflower, and eats so like it, as not to be distinguished from it. This being much more tender than the Roman broccoli, is not so much cultivated in England; for as the gardens near London generally produce great plenty of late cauliflowers, which if the season prove favourable, will continue till Christmas, the Naples broccoli, coming at the same time, is not so valuable.

Besides this first crop of broccoli in England (which is usually sown the end of May), it will be proper to sow another crop the beginning of July, which will come in to supply the table the latter end of March, and the beginning of April, and being very young, it will be extremely tender and sweet.