The beds are raised about two feet high, and thoroughly enriched with well-rotted horse-stable manure. The seeds are sown about the first of April, and the heads are fit to cut by the middle of July.

In September, seeds are again sown for forcing. Prices here are very low - forced heads usually bringing 6d. each; by midsummer, they sell for sixpence, but later in the season the price somewhat advances. Last year prices were exceedingly low, fine heads selling from 4 1/2d. to 5d. After the cauliflowers are cut, the ground is planted with celery, and with such excellent culture as they here receive, one can imagine the immense yield. We were informed that 150 acres around this city were devoted to cauliflower-growing alone. After leaving these grounds, we rode to another lot, where we saw thirty frames, filled with enormous cockscombs, of every shade of color, making a rich show. Carnations in fall bloom, then attracted our notice, not only on account of the great diversity of color and markings, but for the delicious perfume as well. On a covered platform were neatly arranged 10,000 pots, with these very healthy plants, carefully trained to stakes, and filled with bloom. Close beside them, about one acre of seedling plants, all double, were growing in the open ground, and completely covered with blossoms. Only ten per cent. came single, and these had been immediately taken out and destroyed.

Three men attend exclusively to the carnation department, and they are constantly employed during the growing and seeding seasons. Another crop here, rising with the former, is the immense stock of mignonette. As an instance of the amount of its seed grown by this firm, fifty hundred weight is annually gathered and sold. The Ten Weeks' Stocks require very careful attention if the finest strain of seeds is required. About seven plants are grown in a six-inch pot, with a small percentage (two or three) of the same, producing single flowers; the pollen from the double blooms then fertilize the single, and thus ensure in the succeeding generation a satisfactory amount of double blossoms. The pots, of which 200,000 are now in use, are placed on narrow shelves, the latter one above another, until the structure is about twelve feet in height, and at the top covered with a sloping roof. The seeds of "stocks," or, as they were termed by old gardeners, " gillyflowers," will produce from fifty to eighty per cent of doable blossoms.

In one enclosure, we noticed a large wheel bad been recently introduced for the purpose of forcing water to an elevated tank, whence it was distributed all over the grounds; thus one man can now irrigate as much surface as in former times three men accomplished with buckets.

The garden of four acres devoted to testing vegetable seeds is unique in its way. Here were specimens of 3,400 varieties growing, each in its little division, carefully labelled with name and date of sowing, so that customers could not only have an opportunity of making the acquaintance of each, but also ascertain the germinating quality of the seeds, and the percentage that grow.

About eight acres are covered with Balsams (Lady-Slippers, my elderly friends), of almost innumerable shades of color, as well as a great diversity in height. These were set about eighteen inches apart, and the ground preserved scrupulously clean. They require, possibly, more water than any of the so-called " florist's flowers,' and consequently the surface of the soil had been daily drenched. An exceedingly pretty Feverfew, named Mabricaria eximium grandiflorum, was here in perfection, with pure white flowers, neatly quilled. Phlox Drummondii, grown in four-feet beds, was of course a leading feature (ten or twelve acres covered), and the striking difference in color was especially remarked. A variety - William the First - was very distinct, maroon ground, with a white stripe on each petal. In the vast collection of pinks I was particularly struck with the showy Dianthus laciniatus, occupying about one acre, These were not only double (only one-fifth single originally), but very brilliant in the various shades. This strain is said to be the finest in the market. Other kinds of pinks were here in endless profusion, and well worthy of notice, as, for instance, the D. Heddewegii, covering one acre, and the Diadem Pink, about half an acre.

The pansies and larkspurs richly deserve mention, but the excessive drought had told severely on their flowers. Enough remained, however, to tell the tale of beauty, and we could well imagine how attractive they must have appeared early in the season. As we approached the marigold department, embracing two acres, one must see to understand the rich golden color spread out before us. Tinted like the rays of the setting sun, from a pale lemon to a bright yellow, and then changing to a brilliant orange, no work of art could possibly equal it. In the distance, skirting the outer edge, we could see the striped French varieties, forming an agreeable frame, as it were, to the picture. I had previously been prejudiced against this simple, old-fashioned flower, but I must confess my feelings underwent an entire change before leaving this gorgeous sight. Equally as brilliant, and embracing a greater diversity of tints, was the immense collection of tropoeolums, perhaps better known as nasturtiums. Several acres laid out in beds, with each kind pure and uncontaminated, side by side, produced an effect that was really grand.

Gould our old-time florists step into these grounds, and take a glance at the wonderful improvement made in this old-fashioned garden vegetable, they would undoubtedly be at least slightly astonished to see " 'sturtions " so very attractive.

The Scarlet Tom Thumb was probably most brilliant, and King Theodore the deepest in color. Twenty-five acres of asters was next visited, but unfortunately the flowers were only just commencing to expand, and consequently we were not able to enjoy their beauty as we could have wished; but enough were out to judge of their perfection, and it was an easy task to imagine what they would be in a very short time. Well do I remember the Queen Margueirettes of my good old grandmother's garden, and what store was set by those tame old flowers, like the ox-eye daisy of the fields; and yet, in a few short years, the very same plant, by skill and perseverance, has been changed into the greatest perfection of floricnltural beauty. This crop is a specialty here; and, in addition to the above, they have twenty acres more grown for them, making forty-five in all. Our visits to the many small places around Erfurt, where seeds are grown for this one establishment, was quite interesting. At one of these we counted fifteen tall platforms, holding thirty thousand pots of Ten Weeks' Stocks. Seven hundred feet of frames were devoted to the fancy varieties of cucumbers, and, although they were apparently filled with fruit, the owner informed us he would not realize more than one pound of seed from the lot, so unproductive are they in this respect.

At another garden pansies were a specialty; and at another four thousand plants of petunias received the almost undivided care of the proprietor. This vast establishment employs about two hundred and fifty acres in all, one hundred of which are under their immediate supervision. To work this mammoth garden requires one hundred hands, the men receiving from two shillings to two and sixpence per day, and the women one and sixpence.

I could not pretend to enumerate all the very handsome flowers that arrested my attention, but in the foregoing hasty notes I have merely named such as seemed to me especially attractive. Time and space prevent me from describing the finest collection of cactaceae, perhaps, in the whole world, as seen at Haage and Schmidt's extensive grounds near Erfurt; nor, in fact, any of the lesser gardens, of which there are so many in the immediate vicinity, but quite enough has been said already to give my readers a fair insight into what was to me the greatest treat I ever experienced in cultivated flowers.