The time, from the beginning of the fruit to its perfect maturity, cannot be limited to a certain number of days and weeks, since it depends very much on the weather of two summers following. During the spring, when the plants are in the hot-house, a very natural growth may be obtained by heating the stove, and by the sun shining at right angles on the glass, which growth may be continued during the summer. In autumn this cannot be the case, because the sun has less power, and the rains common to that season diminish it still more; therefore, from December at latest, more and more artificial heat must be given to the plants, until they begin in the middle of February, or at farthest in the beginning of March, to show their fruit, which then, with good summer weather and proper treatment, will attain to maturity in the beginning of July, and thus are five months ripening; the fruit, which shows itself in the beginning of March, wants at least a fortnight more to ripen; that which appears in the middle of March wants a month more, and consequently is six months coming to maturity; that which shows itself in April wants still more, and seldom becomes so ripe as to obtain its proper taste and smell. The agreeable smell which the ripe Ananas emits on lifting up the sashes, is the surest proof of maturity: it is then of a deep yellow, and the knobs have brownish yellow spots. The time for removing the plants from the bark bed into the flued pit, and hence again into the bark bed, cannot be fixed, as this depends on the weather, and on the length of summer or winter. In some years I have been obliged to put them in a hot-house in September, and keep them there until April; but in common years they are moved into the hot-house on the 10th or 12th of October, and from thence again into the hot-bed of tan in the middle of March. The flues must be dried by heating them before the plants are brought into the hot-house, not only to remove the damp which, on the first heating, is powerful and injurious, but also to discover whether there are any openings by which the smoke may escape into the hot-house, for they must be carefully stopped up. This pit or wintering house may be of any convenient length or breadth; supposing two joined together, then the fire flues (fig. 1. a. a.) may be formed at the extreme ends; the smoke may first enter and fill a vault of the whole width and length of the pit (b.); it may afterwards enter a flue (c. c.) and pass round the pit, and then out by a chimney in the back wall. [Illustration: 1] The sashes of the pits at Drieoeck are six feet wide, and three and a-half feet broad, and each has a cover of boards which are raised up and let down by means of cords and pullies, the better to retain the heat in the winter months (fig. 2.) Their slope forms an angle, with the horizon of about twenty degrees. [Illustration: 2]