Dec. 1885.] EDITORIAL NOTES. 471 



Editorial Kotes. 



Sulphide of Potassium as a cure for mildew, aphides, and other 

 destructive insect and fungoid pests of trees, is equal if not superior 

 to any other application at present in use. Mildew in young 

 ([uicks or thorns may be arrested or even prevented by timely 

 applications of it whenever it is observed that the conditions of 

 atmosphere prevail that are favourable to the development of the 

 fungus pest. To nurserymen and others who have to rear large 

 numbers of young thorns for hedging, this should be generally 

 known, as it is immensely superior to the clumsy and defective 

 cures usually resorted to by such people. As it can be applied in 

 solution by means of a syringe or garden engine, and leaves the 

 foliage quite free from any clogging sediment, yet rids it of the 

 destructive mildew, it is superior alike in facility of application and 

 in its results. The proportion of the solution is about one ounce of 

 the sulphide of potassium to one gallon of water. 



The importation of mahogany seeds into India appears to be 

 conducted by the authorities with characteristic circumlocution. If 

 a consignment is to be sent from Barbadoes, it appears the order is 

 given by the India Office to the authorities at the Eoyal Gardens, 

 Kew, who transmit it to Barbadoes for execution. The seeds are 

 then shipped to Kev/ and thence forwarded to India. The absurdity 

 of such a method of conducting a transaction of this kind requiring 

 the utmost despatch is extreme. None should know better than the 

 people at Kew that the seed of the mahogany does not retain its 

 vitality long after it is ripe, and that a circuitous and dilatory mode 

 of transmission is certain to be more or less fatal to such a consign- 

 ment. And knowing this, as no doubt the authorities of Kew 

 Gardens do, and also that repeated failures in importing these seeds 

 have already occurred through this cause, surely it is time to ask 

 who is responsible, — the India Office who presumably know nothing 

 about the requirements of the case, or the Kew authorities who do 

 know ? We venture to think the responsibility lies with the latter, 

 and that they should devise a better way of aiding the India Office 

 in carrying out their laudable attempt to increase the growth of 

 mahogany in India. 



