But it is time we turn from these desultory uses and enjoyments of the garden, to some notice of the more practical parts of gardening; although all we can attempt to do, is merely to suggest some few favourite flowers, and give a slight notice of their culture.

The early part of summer is a very busy time, when the task of filling up beds with the small seedlings or other bedding-out plants commences. In most gardens, some of the beds have been filled with early tulips, hyacinths, ranunculuses, etc, etc. Some of these may scarcely be ready for removal in June, when the summer planting-out commences. The roots must be very carefully lifted, the foliage as little injured as possible, and the plants or bulbs should be buried in sand till the leaves decay, before drying the roots for storing them away. The beds must then be dug up, fresh compost added, and the plants put in, gently watered, and pegged down, or tied to stakes, as they may require. Annuals for these beds must of course be sown in spring, so as to be ready for planting-out now, and, as a general rule, the small seedlings may be planted pretty thickly, as some die out and leave unsightly blanks.

About the prettiest annual for bedding out is Saporiaria calabrica, the deep-blue lobelia is another little beauty, the small red nasturtium called Thorn Thumb makes a gay bed, and lasts long in flower; and there is also a beautiful crimsonflox, Linum rubrum, which is a fine contrast of colour to the lobelia. Without going into the regular science of arranging beds in coloured masses, there is still room in the smallest parterres for planting harmonious colours together, and avoiding the error of placing crimson and scarlet, or blue and lilac, beside each other. Scarlet geraniums are frequently planted along with yellow calceolarias or blue salvias, but I think they form a much more pleasing contrast with white jacobea, or double fever-few; the grey lilac of the heliotrope also contrasts well with the bright scarlet, especially when the flowers are gathered for a nosegay; but, as a matter of taste, I prefer the geranium alone in a bed, or mingled with white flowers.

In sowing annuals where they are to remain in patches in the borders, it is not easy to sow some of the small seeds thinly, and some resolution is required to thin the seedlings out after they have sprung up. It must be done, however, or the flowers will be poor, scanty, and soon over; whereas in a well thinned-out bed, where the plants get air and room, they will last much longer in flower, as well as look much better. All that are thus weeded out need not be thrown away; some may be transplanted to other parts of the border, where they will continue in bloom longer than those left in the original bed. Some annuals seem to have greater facility in sowing themselves than others; the little plants thus self-sown come up in the spring : they may then either be transplanted or left where they are, and they will flower earlier and better than those sown by the hand. It is years since we have sown Eschscholtzia Californica, the beds and borders have been altered and dug again and again, and yet, year after year, it springs up in all parts of the garden, and brightens the borders with its golden flowers, more like tropical butterflies than blossoms. Ne-mophila maculata, too, which was thought so much of some seasons ago, grows like a weed in all the beds where it was originally sown, as the little seedlings, when transplanted, grow into handsome spreading plants. One of the most determined instances of an annual thus establishing itself, and actually overrunning the ground, occurred in one portion of the garden, where some beds, separated by gravel walks, made a small separate garden. In 1854, a bed of a small silene-like annual was sown here : the flowers were thought insignificant, though bright, so it was never resown; next year seedlings appeared all over the plots, and, even after being well weeded out, made a gay show in autumn; year after year they came up, till two years ago, when the little garden was remodelled, laid down in turf, and beds cut out in different places. Last summer (1862) there was the plant springing up, as vigorously as ever, in a bed of roses, and there it got leave to remain and flower undisturbed, its perseverance entitling it to rank as an old friend, and not merely as an annual.

No garden, however small, can get on without annuals; their number and variety are endless; but as many of them, if properly treated and planted out, make more show, and flower better, than when sown and left in clumps, there is no need of taking up much ground with them. Some species look well even as single plants, branching out and flowering in an independent free way, quite as handsomely as some biennials. Clarkia pulchella, blue and yellow lupines, purple candytuft, and the large everlastings, seem to like occasionally thus to be left alone in their glory. "Sow thick, thin in time," is said to be a golden rule in cultivating annuals; the thinning should be performed in damp weather, if possible, and the thinnings-out may be transplanted into a separate bed. The sowing of these plants may and ought to be carried on from February till September, so as to have a succession for planting out; indeed, in one of Mr Beatoun's papers in the Cottage Gardener, he goes so far as to say, "I am now convinced that not one of them " (he is treating of annuals) "should ever be allowed to flower without being transplanted, except the mignonette, and two or three others." Further allusion will be made to this subject when we come to our garden work and pleasures in autumn and winter; but if we wish annuals to flower in winter, they must be sown from April till June, and potted off singly or by threes when they spring up. The autumn-sown seeds and self-sown plants springing up in the borders come early into flower, and one use to be made of these is the filling up of blank spaces in the beds when summer half-hardy plants are scarce. Mr Beatoun says, "Flower-beds which were planted properly last May will now (July,) or very soon, require to be thinned out. What I call ' planting properly,'is that the whole surface be as much covered as possible at the first planting, and more particularly the sides, which can hardly be planted too closely. When the stock of plants is too limited to allow of this liberal planting, the next best mode is to have recourse to spring-sown annuals, and to fill up in rows, or in broad patches, between the permanent plants; and as the latter are now spreading freely, these temporary helps must be removed gradually, that is, a few at a time. . . . The proper way to act when summer half-hardy plants are scarce is this, and even where no scarcity is known it is a good plan. The beds being ready in April or May, let the summer plants, as verbenas, petunias, etc, be planted in regular rows, and at such distances as will allow of their getting too crowded before the end of July, and particularly the last row next the grass or gravel; the least spreading plants should have a free space of at least nine inches between them and the edge of the bed, and a foot is not too much for most of them. Then, the beds being so far planted, let regular rows of annuals be transplanted from the reserve garden in the intervening spaces. These will flower and look very gay from the end of May til] this time, when the permanent plants will be so far spread as to require a thinning of the annuals. Virginian stocks in full bloom will easily transplant for this purpose, and so will Sphenogyne speciosa, the prettiest of all yellow annuals while it lasts, navelwort, white, with the purple and white candytuft, Calendula hybrida, white; all the Clarkias, Collinsias, Godetias, with Eucharidium grandiflorum,) Cochlearia a caulis, and many other low things, would easily transplant in the same way, and, after good waterings, would make a gay assemblage, and render the beds not only full of plants, but also with distinct colours, while the summer plants, were getting established.! Annuals sown in the beginning of April, should come into flower in June, while these sown at the end of the month will flower in July. For the early part of Jul another supply may be sown for flowering from August to October. The best annuals for this summer sowing are Viscaria oculata,Conopsis Drummondii, Virginian stocks,candytufts, and eschscholtzia californica. This latter is really a perennial, but it is said to flower best when sown every year, and treated as an annual. Before turning to another department of summer work in the garden, i must indulge myself with an extract from the Cottage Gardener, where Mr Beatoun recommends every one to try the effect of a bed of these two common annuals, Nemophila maculata and insignis. These simple, cheap experiments are indeed one of the chief charms of the garden, and here is an account of one that everybody may try for themselves:--