1870.] HINTS FOR AMATEURS. 213 



number of natural spurs may be formed, which, when well placed to the 

 walls, are very valuable. A number of the top-shoots may be taken 

 off Apples and Pears ; doing a portion every few weeks gives no check, 

 and at winter-pruning the work is made so simple that any one with 

 the least instruction can do it. However, summer-pruning has always 

 to be done according to strength of growth. In ordinary orchards, 

 where trees can grow large and free, the case is quite different to gar- 

 dens where space and order are objects, as well as plenty of fine fruit. 

 We like to see trees, when established, form large firm leaves, little 

 wood, and the bark be free from moss and canker : plenty of fibre 

 growing in good healthy soil near the surface always secures this. If 

 insects of any kind show themselves, a handful or two of Pooley's 

 tobacco-powder, placed in a large potful of w T ater and syringed on 

 finely, will do much to keep off vermin. We have used this powder 

 to some extent dry this season : in the late Peach-house here, about 

 100 feet long, a man went all over it in a few hours, throwing pinches 

 of the dust over the young shoots, many of which were attacked with 

 aphis, and threatened to be thoroughly infested with the vermin ; but 

 no further harm has been done, and the trees are now in full flower. 

 Tobacco-smoke might have done harm, as many plants are in flower 

 and Strawberries in fruit. Gooseberries and Currants may be kept 

 free from caterpillar and "fly" by timely use of tobacco-powder and 

 Clarke's insect-destroyer, if carefully syringed from under side of the 

 bushes. Many of the fruit-trees planted lately will require a soaking 

 of water and careful mulching — syringing overhead is beneficial in dry 

 weather. 



Ptoses will be making rapid progress. Grubs will be found among 

 some of them, and will eat out the hearts of the flowers if not attended 

 to in time. Syringe when fly appears, as recommended for fruit-bushes. 

 Suckers should be taken clean off as soon as they appear. Plant out 

 Violets in all spare corners — such as the base of walls, by margins of 

 shrubberies, &c. When we place them where soil is bad, a hole is dug 

 out and filled with good loam, then the plants have plenty to support 

 tbem, and bloom abundantly. Suckers which are rooted answer best ; 

 but often when suckers are scarce we divide and replant the old plants, 

 which always bloom abundantly. For forcing, Violets can be placed on 

 a bed of earth above faggots of wood, and a lining of dung placed 

 round in winter, after fitting a shallow glazed frame over the plants. 

 Lifting good plants from borders answers well, but these are not always 

 comeatable by amateurs with small means. Asters, Stocks, and other 

 plants may be kept in reserve to fill up vacancies in borders, ifcc. ; good 

 breadths of them planted out about the middle of the month come in 

 useful for show and cutting. All bedding-out plants — such as Pelar- 



