FLOWERS

Syn. Flores , L. These beautiful and fragrant ornaments of our gardens and our dwellings are too highly esteemed by all cla es of the community to require anything in favour of their cultivation to be said here. Our remarks will, therefore, chiefly refer to their collection, improvement, and preservation. ‘Full’ or ‘double flowers,’ or those in which the internal organs become petals, are so much more beautiful than the ‘single flowers’ of the corresponding species and varieties, that their production, with tolerable ease and certainty, has long been a desideratum with both the profe ional and amateur florist. Various plans have been proposed having this object in view, among which are the following:—1. The use of the best seed only, but not before it is at least 3 or 4 years old. 2. The selection of the outer row of seed only, and its careful preservation intact for at least 2 seasons before sowing it. We are a ured that this method is particularly succe ful with dahlias. 3. The removal of the plants to a shady situation as soon as the flower-buds begin to develop themselves, and stinting them with water and nourishment for a few weeks. In this method a few only of the buds are permitted to mature; the rest being snipped off with a pair of sci ors as early as po ible. 4. The use of small pots and a scanty supply of water until the flowers are partly developed, when water is supplied in abundance, with or without the addition of a little liquid manure. To hasten the blooming of flowers, it is a common practice with some gardeners to grow them in as small pots as is consistent with their healthy existence, and carefully to avoid transplanting them to larger pots, for several weeks before their usual time of blo oming. A plant on the point of flowering, if transferred to a larger pot and a richer soil, immediately commences making roots and leaves, whilst the embryo flowers either wholly decay, or their development is checked until the usual season of their production has pa ed over. The following liquid has been used with great advantage to promote the vigorous growth and the early flowering of plants:—Sulphate or nitrate of ammonia, 4 oz.; nitrate of pota a, 2 oz.; sugar, 1 oz.; hot water, 1 pint; di olve and keep it in a well-corked bottle. For use, put 8 or 10 drops of this liquid into the water of a hyacinth gla or jar, for bulbous-rooted plants, changing the water every 10 or 12 days. For flowering plants in pots, a few drops must be added to the water employed for them. The preference should be given to rain water for this purpose. The fluid sold under the name of liquid guano may be used in the same manner. Flowers may be preserved in a fresh state for a considerable time, by keeping them in a moist atmosphere. When growing on the parent stem, the large amount of evaporation from the surface of their leaves is compensated for by an equivalent proportion of moisture supplied by the roots; but when they are plucked, the evaporation from the surface continues, while the supply of moisture is cut off. To supply, in part, this lo of moisture by evaporation, has arisen the almost universal practice of placing flowers in water; but their mutilated stems po e a far inferior power of sucking up fluids to that of the roots, and thus their decay is only deferred for a time. To preserve them more effectually, or at least to render their existence le ephemeral, we may surround them with a moist atmosphere, by which the lo of water from the surface of their leaves will be reduced to the smallest po ible amount. “It is now eighteen years ago since we first saw, in the drawing-room of a gentleman, in the hot dry weather of the dog-days, flowers preserved day after day in all their freshne by the following simple contrivance—A flat dish of porcelain had water poured into it. In the water a vase of flowers was set; over the whole a bell-gla was placed, with its rim in the water. This was a ‘Ward’s case’ in principle, although different in its construction. The air that surrounded the flowers being confined beneath the bell-gla , was kept constantly moist with the water that rose into it in the form of vapour. As fast as the water was condensed it ran down the sides of the bell gla back into the dish; and if means had been taken to inclose the water on the outside of the bell-gla , so as to prevent its evaporating into the air of the sitting-room, the atmosphere around the flowers would have remained continually damp. We recommend those who love to see plenty of fresh flowers in their sitting-rooms in dry weather to adopt this method. The experiment can be tried by inverting a tumbler over a rose-bud in a saucer of water.” (‘Gardener’s Chron.’) Another method by which some flowers may be preserved for many months is to carefully dip them, as soon as gathered, in perfectly limpid gum water, and after allowing them to drain for 2 or 3 minutes, to set them upright, or arrange them in the usual manner in an empty vase. The gum gradually forms a transparent coating on the surface of the petals and stems, and preserves their figure and colour long after they have become dry and crisp. Yet another method (given in the ‘Pharmaceutical Journal’) is as follows:—“A ve el with a movable cover is provided, and having removed the cover from it, a piece of metallic gauze of moderate finene is fixed over it, and the cover replaced. A quantity of sand is then taken sufficient to fill the ve el, and pa ed through a sieve into an iron pot, where it is heated with the addition of a small quantity of stearin, carefully stirred so as to thoroughly mix the ingredients. “The quantity of stearin to be added is at the rate of half a part to 100 parts of sand. Care must be taken not to add too much, as it would sink to the bottom and injure the flowers. The ve el with its cover on and the gauze beneath it is then turned upside down, and the bottom being removed, the flowers to be operated upon are carefully placed on the gauze and the sand gently poured in, so as to cover the flowers entirely, the leaves being thus prevented from touching each other. The ve el is then put in a hot place, such, for instance, as the top of a baker’s oven, where it is left for 48 hours. The flowers thus become dried, and they retain their natural colours. The ve el still remaining bottom upwards, the lid is taken off, and the sand runs away through the gauze, leaving the flowers uninjured. Faded flowers may be generally more or le restored by immersing them half-way up their stems in very hot water, and allowing them to remain in it until it cools, or they have recovered. The coddled portion of the stems must then be cut off, and the flowers placed in clean cold water. In this way a great number of faded flowers may be restored, but there are some of the more fugacious kinds on which it proves usele . Flowers may be produced in winter by taking up the plants, trees, or shrubs in the spring, at the time when they are about to bud, with some of their own soil carefully preserved around the roots, and placing them upright in a cellar till Michael mas; when, with the addition of fresh earth, they are to be put into proper tubs or ve els, and placed in a stove or hot-house, when they must be treated in the usual manner. By this method, in the month of February, fruits or roses will appear. Flowers sown in pots about Michael mas may thus be made to bloom at Christmas. The apparently instantaneous flowering of plants, exhibited a few years ago by M. Herbert to an astonished audience, was, we believe, effected by the heat generated by fragments of quicklime concealed in the mould close to, but not in immediate contact with, the roots. The plants selected by M. Herbert—a group of geraniums and a rose tree—were planted in two rather deep boxes of garden mould, and were covered with gla shades. The operator commenced by pouring over the roots, from a small watering-pot, a liquid which, uniting to the ingredients already in the earth, caused a great heat, as was shown by an intense steam or vapour, which was evolved within the shades, and allowed, to some extent, to escape through a small hole in the top, which at first was kept closed. The effect upon the geraniums was certainly almost instantaneous; the buds beginning to burst in about five or six minutes, and the plants being in full bloom within ten minutes, when the blo oms were gathered by M. Herbert, and distributed amongst the ladies present. With the rose tree the exhibitor was le fortunate. The invention may prove useful where ladies require to decorate their drawing-rooms or boudoirs with the beauties of the floral world somewhat earlier in the season than they can otherwise be obtained. It must not, however, be forgotten that the plants are, as it were, parboiled during the proce , and die after a few days. As regards the sanitary value of flowers, Mantegazza, of Pavia, states that ozone is generated in larger quantities by certain plants po e ing spicy aromatic odours, than by the action of electricity upon the air. He says that in some plants this ozone is developed by the direct rays of the sun, whilst in others the action, once begun in solar light, is continued in darkne ; and that cherry-laurel, clove, lavender, mint, lemon, fennel, narci us, heliotrope, hyacinth, mignonette, ., all produce ozone largely on exposure to the rays of the sun. [315] He also finds that whilst the ozonigenic properties of flowers reside mainly in their perfumes, the most odoriferous yielding the largest amount of ozone, certain others po e ing no particular perfume, have extraordinary ozonigenic power; as, for instance, the sunflower, broad belts of which were planted by the late Commodore Maury around the grounds of the national observatory at Washington, to the effect of which he attributed the after immunity of his family from intermittent fevers. [316] [315] The experiments of Mr Kingzetti on the limited oxidation of e ential oils, lead to the inference that instead of ozone, peroxide of hydrogen is the body evolved.— Ed. [316] Recent researches seem to have shown that the hygienic properties of the sun-flower, like those of the Eucalyptus, are chiefly, if not wholly due to the power the plant po e es of abstracting enormous quantities of moisture from the soil, and thus removing from certain localities an active element in the production of malaria.— Ed. The collection and preservation of flowers for medicinal purposes and distillation, will be found noticed under Vegetables .