The stock of plants out of doors to be carefully looked over in showery
weather that they may not suffer from imperfect drainage. The more
delicate sorts to be returned to the houses, or protected by some means
during heavy rains.
Camellias.--When they are kept in-doors give an abundance of air night
and day, with an occasional application of the syringe, keeping the
paths and floors damp. When they have ceased growing, and have formed
their flower-buds, discontinue to syringe the plants overhead, as it
sometimes starts them into a fresh growth that will be the destruction
of the flower-buds.
Chrysanthemums.--Plant them out eighteen or twenty inches apart in an
open piece of ground. Some to be left to grow as standards on one stem,
and others to be topped, to make them bushy.
Cinerarias.--In raising seedlings it is advisable to select each parent
plant, distinguished for its dwarf habit and decided colour, and to
place them by themselves in a pit or frame. The seed should be carefully
gathered as it ripens. It should be sown in shallow pots, or pans, well
drained with crocks; then some siftings, and over that some light soil,
with some finer and more sandy on the surface, covering the seeds very
lightly with the same; and slightly sprinkling, or watering, through a
very fine rose, and the surface covered with a little moss, to prevent
evaporation. In a few days the seedlings will be up; then remove the
moss, and let them remain in the pots, or pans, until they are large
enough to be handled with safety; then pot them in small pots, and keep
close for a day or two.
Lilium lancifolium.--Give attention to them; as also to tree Carnations,
_Salvia splendens_, Scarlet Geraniums, &c., for autumn and early winter
flowering.
Oranges.--The same as advised for _Camellias_.