:37o.] NOTES OF THE MONTH. 243 



NOTES OF THE MONTH. 



Amoxg the last acts of service done to floriculture by the late Mr 

 Samuel Broome, of Chrysanthemum renown — perhaps the last act — 

 was that of entering a protest against the severely formal manner in 

 which the specimen plants of Chrysanthemums were trained at the 

 autumn show of the Liverpool Horticultural Society. The schedule 

 of prizes to be given at a corresponding exhibition in the present year 

 — as usual a liberal one — has just been issued, and with it a letter 

 written last December by Mr Broome, containing the following pas- 

 sage : " Will you be so good as to call the attention of the Chrysanthe- 

 mum-growers to an excess of training that I observed in some of their 

 plants ? they were too large, and too flatly trained. The centre of the 

 plant ought to be from 9 inches to 1 foot higher than the outside, and 

 the blooms should not be tied down after the bud is of the size of a 

 small Pea. By tying them so late, the stem of the flower is not 

 strong enough to support the bloom erect, and the beauty of the 

 flower is lost, as it is buried in the foliage. I have one more remark 

 to make; viz., there are too many white and yellow varieties ; try next 

 year a few more dark colours." A piece of well-timed counsel : let 

 us hope it will be acted upon at the next exhibition. 



It is time also that a firm and decided stand were taken against that 

 system of flat training on wire frames, followed in the case of the 

 Zonal Pelargonium. Of the two, it is perhaps more offensive to good 

 taste than in the case of the Chrysanthemum, as the habit of the 

 latter plant is but ill adapted for exhibition on the raised stages usually 

 seen at such shows, unless the growth be somewhat reduced by train- 

 ing. This system of flat training in the case of the Zonal Pelargon- 

 ium assumed one of the worst forms in which it was ever seen, at the 

 meeting of the Eoyal Horticultural Society at South Kensington, on 

 the 18th of May. Six plants, forming a collection, were shown trained 

 on flat wire trellises about 4J feet across ; and the plants — by no means 

 well furnished either with branches or flowers — were the most inelegant 

 things in that way ever looked upon. They were so flat in shape, 

 that, had the plants been severed from the roots just at the surface of 

 the soil, each one could have been trundled along the walks of the 

 garden at South Kensington with nearly as much ease as a child's 

 hoop. It is lamentable that judges can be found at a London exhibi- 

 tion willing to award first prizes to such floral monstrosities — something 

 as unlike plants, in the natural freedom and elegance of their growth, 

 as could well be imagined ; plants too, that were both indifferently 

 grown and flowered. When there shall arise judges who will have the 

 courage to mark with strong disapproval, by withholding all prizes from 



