224 



HARD PRESSED AND POROUS SOILS. 



study and enjoyment of thousands and tens of 

 thousands annually, one cannot but concede a 

 liberal share of admiration and thanks to a no- 

 bleman who might follow the example of many 

 others, and make his home his closed castle ; 

 but who prefers, on the other hand, to open, 

 like a national picture gallery, this magnifi- 

 cent specimen of landscape gardening and ar- 

 chitecture, on which his fine taste and ample 

 fortune have been lavished for half a century. 



One has only to visit Windsor and Bucking- 

 ham Palace after Chatsworth, to see the dif- 

 ference between a noble and pure taste, and 

 a royal want of it. The one may serve to 

 educate and reform the world. The utmost 

 that the other can do, is to dazzle and aston- 

 ish those who cannot recognize real beauty 

 or excellence in art. 



A. J. D. 



Derbyshire, August, 1350. 



Is Hard Pressed Soil better adapted to the Growtli of Plants than Porous Soil? 



BY THOS. MEEHAN, PHILADELPHIA. 



In your highly interesting account of Mr. 

 Rivers' nursery in your last, you gave an 

 account of the manner in which one of the 

 most celebrated English market gardeners, 

 (WiLMOT, I presume,) successfully practices 

 the forcing of the strawberry. The soil in 

 the pots is pounded down quite hard with a 

 mallet, and in it the plant soon strikes root, 

 and fills the pots with an abundance of fibres. 



You invite your readers to speculate upon, 

 and explain this new problem in horticulture. 

 I am delighted at your invitation — not be- 

 cause I feel that I can explain its cause, or 

 that I can offer any speculative hypothesis ; 

 but because you have, in that invitation, 

 placed before the horticultural Avorld a sub- 

 ject for its consideration, which I have unsuc- 

 cessfully studied for years. I am delighted, 

 because it will doubtless be the means of at- 

 tracting together such a mass of facts, obser- 

 vations, and opinions, that I may be enabled 

 to form some rational theory on a subject I 

 have had so long under consideration. 



I am sure that you, Mr. Editor, in the 

 course of your long and varied experience, 

 must frequently have observed the truth of an 

 axiom, delivered by that great man, who has 

 so recently gone from amongst us — Kirby, 



the entomologist, — that "facts, in themselves 

 seemingly trifling, are often of the greatest 

 importance to the physiologist and natural 

 philosopher." I have found that this is true ; 

 and so, doubtless, have many of your readers. 

 The firmly pressed soil in Wilmot's straw- 

 berry pots, may lead to results as great in 

 the practice of horticulture, as the falling of 

 an apple has been to the science of astronomy ; 

 or the lifting by steam of a kettle lid, has 

 been to mechanical knowledge. I have not 

 much to throw into your treasury of know- 

 ledge on this subject ; but I send in the best 

 contribution I can just now afi"ord. 



My first observations are connected with 

 the vmfortunate potato. It was not long after 

 my good father had permanently taken me 

 with him, to teach me the beautiful intrica- 

 cies of the various branches of his profession, 

 that we were walking together through our 

 farm, where the men were digging potatoes. 

 In this field, were crops of salsify, scorzonera, 

 carrots, parsneps, beets, and other kitchen 

 stuff, which were mostly in daily requisition, 

 and this with other reasons for crossing it, com- 

 bined to make the headlaiids quite a road, — 

 so much so, that perhaps for four or six feet 

 wide, the potatoes were often trodden under 



