432 



FOREIGN NOTICES. 



under certain restrictions and supervision as to va- 

 riety of cultivatioHj order, and neatness, &c,, and 

 who undertakes to instruct in practical gardening 

 a certain number of pupils (usually about a dozen,) 

 to whom the academy has lectures delivered in a 

 building erected for the purpose, containing also a 

 residence for the lecturer. Mr. Lundstrom, as 

 gardener, has also a very agreeable residence in 

 the garden The present lecturer and superintend- 

 ent, on the part of the academy, is Professor Wiks- 

 trom. Mr. I^undstrom is the great nursery and 

 seedsman of Stockholm ; has realised a considerable 

 fortune ; is a knight of the order of Wasa, and pos- 

 sessor of a landed estate and country seat. The 

 garden (that is to say the part cultivated as a 

 nursery,) contains about seven tonners, a measure, 

 I believe, larger than our acre, and is in excellent 

 cultivation, containing a great variety of trees, 

 shrubs, ornamental as well as economical, and 

 kitchen-garden plants all in very neat beds or rows, 

 and all labelled. The establishment is said to turn 

 out very good gardeners. 



The Agricultural Academy's experimental gar- 

 den is also within a couple of miles of Stockholm, 

 and appears to be very well conducted under the 

 immediate management of the gardener, Mr. Stin- 

 berg, and the superintendence and inspection of 

 Professor Wahlberg, who, unfortunately for me, is 

 now absent on an excursion in Scania. A conside- 

 rable variety of corn, as well as of grasses, and 

 other forage roots, &c., are here cultivated in larger 

 or smaller patches, according to the particular ob- 

 ject in view. By repeated experiments, and com- 

 parative cultivation, the gardener finds the Festuca 

 arundinacea, Schreb- (F. littorea, Wahlenb.) the 

 best of all grasses, at least for all Swedish soils, 

 and certainly a field of it in this garden looked re- 

 markably well — tall-growing, but with a great deal 

 of foliage, and the whole field was very regular and 

 thick, and cattle are said to be very fond of it. 



I have, as usual, made inquiries here about po- 

 tatoes, which are very much cultivated in Sweden. 

 The disease last year made considerable ravages in 

 Scania, where it was as bad as in Denmark ; but 

 northward it was much less prevalent, and in this 

 neighborhood I am assured that there was no da- 

 mage done of any consequence. About Upsala, Pro- 

 fessor Fries observed it, and has written a pam- 

 phlet on the subject. He, though a mycologist, is 

 entirely on the side of those who consider the lungus 

 as a result, not the cause of the disease. Nothing 

 has as yet appeared of the disease this year in any 

 part of Sweden, as far as I can learn. 



On the subject of vegetables, an excellent one 

 much eaten here, but which we never get in Eng- 

 land, is the Pois sabre, or Pois sans parchemin, of 

 which the young pods are eaten stewed. They are 

 very sweet, and entirely without any stringiness, 

 even when raw. For. Cor. Gardeners^ Chron. 



Brazilian Preparation of India-Rubber. — 

 At 10 o'clock we stopped at an Anatto plantation, 

 awaiting the tide, and here we saw the manufacture 

 of rubber. The man of the house returned from 

 the forest about noon, bringing in nearly two gal- 

 lons of milk, which he had been engaged since day- 

 light in collecting from 120 trees that had been 



tapped upon the previous morning. This quantity 

 ol milk, he said, would suffice for 10 pair of shoes, 

 and when he himself attended to the trees he could 

 collect the same quantity every morning for several 

 months. But his girls could only collect from 70 

 trees. The Seringa trees do not usually grow 

 thickly, and such a number may require a circuit of 

 several miles. In making the shoes, two girls 

 were the artistes, in a little thatched hut which 

 had no opening but the door. From an inverted 

 water-jar, the bottom of which had been broken 

 out for the purpose, issued a column of dense white 

 smoke, from the burning of a species of Palm-nut, 

 and which so filled the hut that we could scarcely 

 see the inmates. The lasts used were of wood ex- 

 ported from the United States, and were smeared 

 with clay to prevent adhesion. In the leg of each 

 was a long stick serving as a handle. The last 

 was dipped into the milk and immediately held over 

 the smoke, which, without much discolouring, dried 

 the surface at once. It was then re-dipped, and 

 the process was repeated a dozen times until the 

 shoe was of sufficient thickness, care being taken 

 to give a greater number of coatings to the bottom. 

 The whole operation, from the smearing of the last 

 to placing the finished shoe in the sun, required less 

 than five minutes. The shoe was now of a slightly 

 more yellowish hue than the liquid milk, but in the 

 course of a few hours it became of a reddish brown. 

 After an exposure of 24 hours, it is figured as we 

 see upon the imported shoes. This is done by the 

 girls with small sticks of hard wood, or the needle- 

 like spines of some of the Palms. Stamping has 

 been tried, but without success. The shoe is now 

 cut from the last and is ready for sale, bringing a 

 price of from ten to fifteen vintens, or cents, per 

 pair. It is a long time before they assume the 

 black hue. Brought to the city, they are assorted, 

 the best being laid aside for exportation as shoes, 

 the others as waste rubber. The proper designa- 

 tion for this latter, in which are included bottles, 

 sheets, and any other form excepting selected 

 shoes, is boracha, and this is shipped in bulk. 

 There are a number of persons in the city who 

 make a business of filling shoes with rice chaff and 

 hay previous to their being packed in boxes. They 

 are generally fashioned into better shape by being 

 stretched upon lasts after they arrive at their final 

 destination. By far the greater part of the rubber 

 exported from Para goes to the United States, the 

 European consumption being comparatively very 

 small. Voyage up the Amazon. 



The Seven Ash Trees of Tewin. — Upwards 

 of 50,000 persons have, during the last five years, 

 visited the tomb of Lady Ann Grimston, m the 

 churchyard of Tewin, Hertfordshire, which displays 

 one of the most extraordinary freaks in which it is 

 proverbial that Nature delights. The masonry of 

 the tomb — once firmly set and bound together with 

 iron pins — is now disjointed and displaced, not by 

 time or decay, but by the irrepressible growth of 

 trees never planted by human hands. The ap- 

 pearance which the tomb presents is most singular. 

 Within, and interlacing the iron railing surrounding 

 the tomb, are seven ash trees connected at the root, 

 and three sycamores also connected at the root. 



