given when it exceeds that. The moisture in the air must also be proportionately increased, and should be done by sprinkling the paths and walls with tepid water two or three times a-day, instead of steaming the pipes for the present. A watchful eye must be kept on the state of the soil, and no more water given than is sufficient to keep it moist, but not wet. With too much water, and the degree of top and bottom heat now necessary, the tendency of pines to make growth at this season and miss starting for the time being is increased. With these conditions the plants having a mass of healthy roots in an irritable state will soon show signs of motion, and all the more surely in proportion as the heat and moisture are steadily administered.

In February the heat must be advanced to 70° at night, and 75° by day, and air put on when it exceeds 80° with sun, shutting up the house early in the afternoon so as to husband sun-heat. The moisture in the air must not be much more than in January, and the same cautious application of water to the root must be observed till the fruit makes its appearance. Most of the plants will show fruit before the last week of February. The centres of the plants will be observed to open by degrees, and on examining them the young fruit will be found emerging from the centre. Whenever this is observed, the plants, if inclining to the dry side, should have a watering sufficient to thoroughly moisten the whole ball, and the bottom heat already named should be steadily kept up.

Supposing all the plants to have shown fruit, the

night temperature for March should not range under 70° nor over 75°. There being generally great fluctuations of weather during this month, the temperatures I have named should be aimed at accordingly. The moisture in the air must be sparingly applied till the fruit is out of flower, and air admitted on all fine days, putting it on early in the morning and shutting it off early in the afternoon. Water at the root will be more frequently required, especially when they are plunged over a hot-air chamber. But avoid, as one of the greatest possible evils, a wet sloppy state of the soil. As soon as they are out of flower, sprinkle them overhead every fine afternoon with clear water at a temperature of 80°. As the season advances, with longer days and shorter nights, early shutting up with sunheat must be practised; but, except with sun-heat, I do not recommend in April much or any increase of night temperature over that recommended for March, even though it be required to ripen the fruit with as much speed as possible. The forcing should be accelerated by day with sun-heat. They should be shut up soon after three o'clock, with a gentle dewing overhead, filling up the steaming-trays, sprinkling the surface of the plunging material and about the collars or bottom leaves of the plants. The temperature may then be run up to 90° for an hour or two. The fires, which should now be low through the day, should be quickened in time to keep the heat from falling below the maximum night heat at 10 P.M.

Under this treatment the fruit will swell rapidly, and careful attention must be paid to watering.

The great thing to be aimed at being to keep the soil in a healthy growth-giving state-moist, but not wet —it is a common practice to give occasional strong watering, with guano, sheep, or deers' dung. Instead of this, I prefer, as already directed for succession plants, to water every time with a weaker solution of these manures, and I prefer guano to any other; and during the rapid growing season, I always put a little of it into the evaporating pans once or twice a-week, and find it gives that fine dark-green hue and thickness of texture so desirable to see in pines. They should be gone over as soon as the suckers appear, and where there are more than two to a plant remove them. When suckers or gills appear on the stems or under the base of the fruit, they should be removed immediately they are discovered.

The month of May generally brings comparatively warm sunny weather, and vegetation gets into full play; and I am not sure but what May is the very best month in the whole year for swelling off pines. It is not generally so hot and scorching as the succeeding three months; less air is therefore needed. The pineries can be shut up earlier, so that less evaporation goes on, and the swelling fruit can have a longer period of sun-heat and moisture in the afternoon than when the sun is more powerful, and it is not safe to damp and shut up before four o'clock. Advantage should therefore be taken of these circumstances, and the fruit pushed on, when it is an object to get them ripe as soon as possible. Under these circumstances the heat may be run up to 100° for an hour or two,

with the air loaded with moisture; syringing must not, however, be to excess, or the result will be large crowns and an undue growth of suckers, to the detriment of the size and appearance of the fruit.

When the fruit begins to change colour, which, if the plants have been set agoing in January, will be in the end of May or early in June, it is necessary, in order to get highly-flavoured fruit, to increase the amount of air, and decrease the moisture both in the air and soil. Indeed, as soon as the fruit shows signs of turning yellow at the base no more water should be given, and the moisture of the atmosphere should be gradually withdrawn.

RETARDING AND KEEPING PINE-APPLES AFTER THEY ARE RIPE.

When a greater number of pines begin to ripen at any given time than is necessary to supply the demand, it then becomes desirable that a portion of them should be retarded to form a succession of fruit in good condition. In the absence of a compartment specially for the purpose, I have frequently placed them in a vinery where grapes are nearly ripe, and where the temperature is comparatively cool with a circulation of dry air. In such a place, pines that have begun to colour ripen slowly, and they are excellent in flavour. The cool dry air of the vinery, and the shade of the vines, are good retarding conditions; and this is as good a way, apart from having a place for the purpose, as any that I have tried. I

have also removed them to a cool dry room when about half coloured, and kept them there a month or six weeks and found them in excellent condition. This treatment, of course, applies to summer fruit. Later in the season I have kept Smooth-leaved Cayennes in a room for six weeks after they were quite ripe. In this way a succession of fruit can be very much extended as compared to keeping them in a warm pinery.

When the fruit is all cut from a pit or houseful of plants, the suckers should be carefully attended to. The dry condition of the air and soil which is necessary to good flavour is not favourable to the suckers at this hot season of the year; consequently, when the suckers are strong, I frequently detach them from the plant as soon as the fruit begins to colour. If the suckers are small when the fruit is cut, they should be left on the parent plant; then the soil should have a good watering to encourage them to make further growth. It rarely occurs that they are not quite large enough to be potted about the time the fruit begins to ripen. I may here remark, that the practice of allowing the suckers to lie in a cool dry place, with the object of what is called drying them, is one for which I never could see any reason, or any good end that could be gained by it. On the contrary, in my opinion, the practice is injurious to the progress of the young plants. To To say the least of it, it is attended with a loss of time.

When it is desirable to have the fruiting plants of which I am now treating to ripen earlier than the