Following Mr. Pollock's communication in the December number of the Monthly, you state that Mr. Cope flowered the real Egyptian lotus, Nelumbium speciosum, in the open air, by first starting the plant under glass. I have cultivated this plant for the last four or five years, and have proved beyond a doubt that it is perfectly hardy in this climate.

For three winters it has stood the test without the slightest injury underneath ice six inches thick.

I have it naturalized in one corner of a mill-pond, where, could you have visited me last summer, I could have shown you a bit of Nile scenery consisting of a fine bed of this ancient plant, with abundance of noble leaves from one to two feet in diameter; one hundred buds in all stages of development, and twenty expanded flowers at one time. Nelumbium luteum is a beautiful plant, and well worth cultivating, but N. speciosum is in every way much more desirable. I find it much easier to transplant and establish. It grows more rapidly and flowers more freely than N. luteum. It will flower the first season it is planted, which is seldom the case with N. luteum. With me it begins to bloom early in July, and produces a constant succession of flowers until late in October. At least this is the case as grown in my largest artificial basin, where last summer it produced (entirely without artificial heat) some leaves thirty inches across on foot-stalks five and six feet in length, and flower-stalks the same length as the latter, one, however, measuring seven feet.

Many of the flowers were eleven and twelve inches across when fully expanded, and one measured thirteen inches from tip to tip of petals. The first day the flowers appear like gigantic tea rose buds of a bright rose color. The second day they open like a tulip, the base of the petals being creamy white, beautifully shaded off into bright pink. The third day the flower opens more broadly, and is still lighter in color. They are also delightfully fragrant. This plant can be grown in a large half-hogshead, but a better plan is to have a basin of brick and cement sunk in the ground. One six feet in diameter and two feet deep would answer very well. It could be covered with boards and litter in winter.