212 THE FLORAL "WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



the envy of hundreds of cultivators, whose peach walls are neither very 

 green nor very fruitful. The trees are all in the form of open bushes, 

 six to eight feet high and as much through. Having been planted 

 originally six feet apart every way, they now form quite a thicket, and 

 probably it will be necessary this season to remove every other tree. 

 The growth of this season consists for the most part of stout rods a 

 yard in length, and the leafage is luxuriant and healthy. The trees 

 were all planted in February 1859. 



The grand test of this possibility is the fruit. Of this there had 

 been a large crop. Nearly all the apricots had been gathered, some 

 kinds of peaches and nectarines were not quite ripe, and others were in 

 full perfection; and they only differed from wall-fruit in being generally 

 speaking rather smaller. In colour and flavour they could not be sur- 

 passed ; and the plentifulness with which (with few exceptions) they 

 are produced ought to encourage amateurs who have the advantage of 

 a good climate to make a fair trial of this mode of culture. From 200 

 to 500 fruit is the ordinary production of each tree. A tree of Royal 

 George produced in 1863 100 fruit ; this year it produced 700. Trees 

 of Early Ann peach produced over 400 fruit apiece in 1861 and 1865. 

 Last year a tree of Red Magdalen produced 600, and this year 500 

 fruit. So much for Mr. Illman's peach orchard. 



At the great International Exhibition, held at Edinburgh on the 

 6th of last month, Messrs. J. and C. Lee, of the Vineyard Nurseries, 

 Hammersmith, exhibited samples of a fine seedling peach, called Royal 

 Vineyard, which were as large and nearly as good colour as the best 

 samples of Barrington in the room, and they were the production of a 

 tree that had grown from seed in one of the open quarters, and upon 

 which there had been bestowed absolutely no care whatever. Truthfully 

 speaking, it was one of the weeds of the nursery, for it was self-sown, 

 and had grown to a fruiting state without even the knowledge of the 

 proprietors, and the ripe fruit which was exhibited was discovered on 

 the tree by a mere accident. 



It would, perhaps, be rash to aver, that in all the southern counties 

 these fruits can be grown as well without walls as with them. But it 

 is very certain, that there are many gardens so sheltered from the east, 

 and so open to the south and west, say, below the latitude of Notting- 

 ham, wherein peaches, nectarines, and apricots might be grown on bush 

 trees with as much certainty as plums and pears. The expensiveness 

 of walls deters many an amateur from the cultivation of these delicious 

 fruits. It is, surely, worth while to give bushes a fair trial ; especially 

 as, if they intend to fruit at all, they are sure to begin in the third 

 season from planting, and some may even show fruit in the second. 



Another suggestion of the possibilities of the climate has been 

 obtained in the garden of Mr. Roach Smith, the eminent antiquary ; 

 and again we must take the reader to Strood for an agreeable lesson. 

 Mr. Smith's garden is certainly happily situated, facing south in a 

 warm dry spot on the chalk. Mr. Smith is an enthusiastic pomologist, 

 and has a good collection of all kinds of hardy fruits, but his speciality 

 is an open-air vineyard, wherein Muscadine, Chasselas Musque, and 

 Black Hamburgh, with other fine grapes, are gloriously prolific and 

 ripen perfectly. Some of the vines are planted against a terrace wall, 



