inch; but where it is dry, light, or sandy, at least two inches should be given them.

Crocuses will flower in water like Hyacinths and other bulbs; but when intended for the house, it is preferable to plant them in pots of earth, which should be kept moderately moist, and in a sunny window; but when in blossom, a more shady situation will lengthen the duration of their flowers.

The catalogues of modern florists mention numerous varieties of the Spring Crocus. The yellow is the most showy for the garden, and the purple the most beautiful; the white the least conspicuous, and the striped the most curious, particularly the blue striped, and the yellow striped with black. Like the Tulip, new varieties with fanciful names, are annually imported from Holland, but they are seldom raised from seed in this country.

The Spring Crocus is a native of Italy and Spain. In Switzerland it is found wild with white petals, having a little purple at the base; and Gesner found it with a yellow flower on the Glarus moun→ tains.

Both the purple and the white have been discovered as natives of Austria.

The Crocus appears to have been first cultivated in our gardens during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, as Gerard observes that "That pleasant plant that bringeth forth yellow flowers, was sent unto me from Robinus of Paris."

As it may greatly assist the cultivator of flowers to understand the physiology of plants, and more particularly of such bulbs as increase in the earth by their viviparous powers, we notice those of the most singular habits, which, we trust, will not be found uninteresting to the general reader; as by want of attention to the time and mode of the increase of bulbs, many plants are naturally lost by the ignorant gardener, who frequently cuts off the leaves of Crocuses when past flowering, for the sake of neatness.

This is a fatal error, as it weakens their power of perfecting the new bulb, and consequently of flowering the following year; for whilst the fibrous roots assist by suction the nourishment of the future plant, the leaves contribute to it in a no less degree, by their means of absorption and exhalation-for that gas forms a most vital principle in the vegetable kingdom, is clearly ascertained by the known quantity of carbonic acid which green leaves take in during the day, and the portion of oxygen they give out in a state of gas during the night. Thus the leaves of plants are to vegetables what the lungs are to the animal creation. The bulb is merely a body that protects the heart, or germ, from outward injury, whilst it receives and contains the necessary nourishment to form a new plant; and when it has filled its stores, the fibrous roots and the foliage have their communication

stopped and wither at the same time, and until this has taken place bulbs should never be removed.

The Crocus bulb differs from that of the Snowdrop already described, by being a solid, instead of a coated body; consequently, the germ of the Crocus is situated at the top instead of the bottom of the bulb, and hence it is that the new bulbs are thrown out at the top, instead of being separated at the bottom, as in the instance of the Galanthus.

The Crocus frequently produces from three to five new bulbs, but the parent is quite exhausted in the nourishment it affords to its offspring and its flower, leaving no part of the original bulb but a dry outer skin or husk. Of the Autumna, or Saffron Crocus, we have written at large in the History of cultivated Vegetables

DAISY. Bellis.

Natural Order Cmposite Discoidea. Corymbifera, Juss. A Genus of the Syngenesia Polygamia SuperAua Class.

By dimpled brook and fountain brim,

The wood-nymphs, deck'd with Daisies trim,
Their merry wakes and pastimes keep.

MILTON'S Comus.

THE Daisy has been made the emblem of Innocence, because it contributes more than any other flower to infantine amusement and the joys of childhood:

in the spring and play-time of the year,
That calls the unwonted villager abroad
With all her little ones, a sportive train,
To gather kingcups in the yellow mead,
And prank their hair with Daisies.

COWPER.

Those who have passed their early days amongst Daisy-spangled meadows will forcibly feel the many sweet allusions made to this favourite plaything of infancy by the poet in manhood. The very name of this star of the fields seems to renovate the imagination, and carry us back to our earliest pleasures; and to shew that we are not the only people who sport in our youth with this pretty flower, we shall

notice a French verse, and a game of their playful children, who, forming a circle, strip off a petal each from the single Daisy, repeating, Il m'aime un peu, passionément, pas du tout, and so on to the last, fearing all the time to pronounce the word in which the circle should finish.

La blanche et simple Paquerette,

Que ton cœur consulte sur tout,

Dit: ton amant, tendre fillette,

T'aime, un peu, beaucoup, point du tout.

The French name this flower Marguerite as well as Paquerette. Thence St. Louis took for a device on his ring a Daisy and a Lily, in allusion to the name of the Queen, his wife, and to the arms of France, to which he added a sapphire, on which a crucifix was engraved, surrounded with this motto:

"Hors cet annuel, pourrions-nous trouver amour?" because, as this prince said, it was the emblem of all he held most dear-religion, France, and his spouse. Lady Margaret, Countess of Richmond, bore three white Daisies (Marguerites) on a green turf.

How much this little flower was regarded in the fourteenth century, by the father of English poetry, the frequent mention and high commendation of Chaucer will prove.

-of all the floures in the mede,

Then love I most these floures white and rede,