2 parts of beeswax, 1 part of resin, 1 part powdered colour (Venetian red). Melt the beeswax and resin in an old iron saucepan. (Only melt, do not boil.) Then stir in the colour and let it cool a little, both no to avoid the pungent vapours and to thicken slightly. Dip the corked tops of the bottles while holding them horizontally over the pot, and turn them round, so as to run the extra stuff into the joint; they are the better for a second dip. Leave the remains of the wax to harden in the pot, which should be used for this purpose only. It can be melted again at any time, and more added as wanted. May 30th.-A good deal of real gardening pleasure and satisfactory ornamental effect is to be had from growing plants in pots and tubs, vases and vessels of all kinds, both in small and big gardens. I use large Sea-kale pots, when they are no longer wanted for the Sea-kale, by turning them upside down, putting two bits of slate in the bottom of the pot, some drainage and a few lumps of turf, and filling it up with really good soil. As a variety a Rhubarb-pot is useful. If you live near a pottery, they will turn you out pots to any shape you fancy. Flat ones, like those used by house-painters, make a pleasant change, especially for small bulbs; also petroleum casks cut in two, burnt inside, then tarred and painted. It must never, of course, be in any case forgotten to have holes large enough to make good drainage. I use butter casks treated in the same way, and have some little oak tubs in which bullion came from America. These are very strong; and some water-loving plants do much better in wood, since the evaporation in summer is not nearly so rapid as from the earthenware. That is an important thing to remember, both as regards sun and wind. If the plants are at all delicate, and brought out of a greenhouse, the pots, when standing out, ought to be either quite sunk into the earth or shaded. This cannot, of course, be done in the case of pots placed on a wall or terrace, or on a stand; constant care about watering is, therefore, essential. Even in wet weather they often want more water if the sun comes out, as the rain wets the leaves, but hardly affects the soil at all. On the Continent, where all kinds of pot-cultivation have been longer practised than in England, flowerpots are often glazed outside, which keeps the plants much moister, and makes less necessity for frequent watering. The French, especially, understand much better than we do the potting-on of plants. They begin by putting seeds into pots no bigger than a thimble, and sinking them in boxes with cocoanut fibre; the little plants are then potted-on very gradually, never injuring the roots at all. The merciless way in which gardeners often tear off the roots collected at the bottom of a pot is most injurious to the plant. The large red jars that still bring oil from Italy, covered with their delightful coarse wicker-work, are useful ornaments in some gardens. They are glazed inside, and boring a hole in the bottom of them is not very easy work. They have to be more than half filled with drainage; and plants do not do well in them for more than one season, as the surface of earth exposed at the top is so small. In old days the oil merchants in the suburbs of London used to cut them in two vertically, and stick them against their houses above their shops, as an advertisement or ornament. Enthusiastic amateurs will find that they get two very nice pots by sawing them in half horizontally, just below the sham handles. The top part, when reversed, requires the same treatment as was recommended for the Sea-kale pots. Many different things may be grown for standing out of doors in the large pots and tubs above described, and one plant may succeed another. The first rule, I think, is to grow in them those plants which do not grow especially well in your own local soil. To put into a pot what is flourishing much better in a bed a few yards off is, to my mind, a mistake.

I grow in pots large old plants of Geraniums-Henry

Jacoby is especially good. They are kept on in the greenhouse from year to year, their roots tied up in moss and crowded into a pot or box with no earth and very little water through the winter; early in April they are potted-up and protected by mats in a pit, as we have no room for them in the greenhouse. This causes them to be somewhat pot-bound, and they flower brilliantly during the latter part of the summer. French Marguerites (the yellow and the white) with large leaves are good pot-plants early in the year-far prettier than the narrow-leaved kinds. A double Pomegranate I have had for many years in a pot; and if pruned out in the summer, it flowers well. The large, old-fashioned, oak-leaved, sticky Cape Sweet Geranium, which has a handsomer flower than the other kinds, makes a very good outdoor pot-plant. In potting-up strong, growing plants that are to remain in the pots for some time, it is useful to put some broken-up bones with the crocks at the bottom of the pots for the roots to cling to them.

Fuchsias, especially the old-fashioned fulgens, are satisfactory. Carnations-Eaby Castle, Countess of Paris, and Mrs. Reynolds Hole-I grow in pots, and they do extremely well; they must be layered early in July, and answer best if potted up in September and just protected from severe frosts. This year we took up a large clump of Montbretias out of a dry sunny bed of Cape bulbs in the kitchen garden, just as they were coming through the ground, and dropped them into a large Sea-kale pot. They flowered exceedingly well, and in September we put them back in the dry border to die down. In fine summers Myrtles and Oleanders flower well with us in tubs, not in the open ground. We treat Oleanders as they do in Germany-cut them back moderately in October, and dry them off, keeping them in a coach-house, warm shed, or wherever severe frosts will not reach them.

When quite dry, they stand a moderate amount of frost. Then in March they are brought out, the ground is stirred and mulched, and they are taken into a greenhouse and brought on a bit. In May they are thickly covered with good strong horse-manure and copiously watered. At the end of the month they are stood out in the open on a low wall. During May, June, and July they cannot have too much water; after that they want much less, or the leaves turn yellow and drop off. Campanula pyrami-dalis (see 'English Flower Garden'), a biennial, does well in pots-blue and white both in one pot, or apart. The seedlings have to be potted up in autumn (plants a year old); as with the Canterbury Bells, if you cut off the fading flowers the flowering season is much prolonged. Canterbury Bells (Campanula medium) make charming pot-plants for large rooms or corridors in May or June. They are annuals, and the seed can be sown out of doors in March or April, keeping the seedlings well thinned, transplanting in the autumn, and potting-up the following spring (see 'English Flower Garden'). If strong crowns of Campanula persicifolia are potted up in autumn, they force beautifully in a moderate greenhouse in spring, and are most satisfactory for picking or otherwise.

Some years I grow Solanum jasminoides over bent wires in pots; they are rather pretty. Clethra (Sweet Pepper Bush), a small North American shrub, we lifted from the reserve garden in June and put into a pot, and it flowered very well. The variety of plants which can be experimented upon for growing in pots out of doors in summer is almost endless. Love-lies-bleeding (Ama-ranthus caudatus) is an annual; but if sown in January, and very well grown-on as a fine single specimen plant, it looks handsome and uncommon in a green glazed pot or small tub. Nothing we grow in pots is more satisfactory than the old-fashioned Calceolaria amplexi-caulis. It does not grow to any perfection in the beds, the soil being too dry; but, potted, it makes a splendid show through the late summer and autumn months. A red-brown kind, little grown now, which I brought from Ireland, and which I cannot name, also succeeds very well. They both want potting-up in good soil in April. The shrubby Veronicas (Speciosa rubra, Imperialis, and the variegated Andersoni) I grow in pots because they flower beautifully in the autumn; and the drowsy bumblebees love to lie on them, in the sunshine, when the Sedum spectabile is passing away. They are not quite hardy with us, as they cannot withstand the long, dry, cold springs. This in itself justifies the growing them in pots; in mild, damp districts they are large shrubs. The small bushy Michaelmas Daisies we put into pots at the end of July, and they fill up blank spaces on the wall late in the year.

The blue Cape Agapanthus everybody grows in tubs. They have to be rather pot-bound and kept dry in the winter, to flower well; as the flower-buds form, they want to be well watered and a weekly dose of liquid manure. Hydrangeas I find difficult to grow when planted out. The common kinds do exceedingly well in tubs, in half-shady places, if they get a good deal of water. A variegated half-hardy shrub called Procosma variegata makes a showy and yet restrained pot-plant. Large standard Myrtles I have had covered with blooms in August in tubs. My large old plant, which I had had many years, was killed this spring by being turned out of the room it had wintered in too early, because we came from London sooner than usual. The great difficulty in small places is housing these large plants in winter. They do not want much protection, but they must have some; and the death of large old plants is grievous. We have just built a new greenhouse, which we are going to try with no heating beyond a lamp-stove in very cold weather. If I lived in the country in the winter, I should grow small Evergreens in pots and try various experiments, which are of no use to me, as I live in London. In many cases the plants would not get injured by frost if one pot were sunk inside another.