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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1849 Excerpt:...known for the fragrance of its flowers, and for an oil which they yield by distillation in water. L. Stoe'chas, the French Lavender, is a more ornamental plant than the common kind,but somewhat tender. Both require a dry calcareous soil, and an open airy situation. The common Lavender is cultivated on a large scale at Mitcham, and also at Henleyon-Thames. At both places it is propagated by cuttings of the young wood planted in autumn; and seeds are sold in the seed-shops. Lava'tera.--Malvacece.--A very showy annual, common in flowergardens, which only requires sowing in the open border in March or April. There are two other species which are shrubs.--See Tree Mallow. Lawn.--Smooth mown turf, when of any extent in pleasure-grounds, is called a lawn; and its chief beauties are the uniformity of its surface, and uniformity in the kinds of grasses which cover it, and which produce an uniform tone of green. These objects are produced by first preparing the soil, which should be a sandy loam, or a loam slightly inclining to sand, of a foot or more in depth, and equally drained throughout, so as everywhere to retain the same degree of moisture. Next, the same mixture of grasses should be sown throughout, and lastly they should be mown at regular intervals, say of a fortnight during the summer months, and a month during spring and autumn. Whenever coarse grasses, or broad-leaved plants of any kind appear, they should be taken out with the spud; and whenever any spot becomes bare, the soil should be renewed, and pieces of fresh turf introduced, or seeds sown; also when worms disfigure the surface, the castings which they throw up should be scraped off, and the surface watered with lime-water, by which all the worms will be destroyed. In general, it is impossible to...