316 



THE GARDENER'S MONTHLY 



[ October, 



t le walls and pruned annually, that were yet of 

 very large size. I measured a Glout Morceau 

 which nipaaured three feet nine inches round. 



One of the pleasiintcst features of my visit to 

 Oshorne was the acqiuiintance of Mr. Todinan, 

 the uardener. When I left my native land 

 Mr. Winchester was gardener here. Like so 

 many scores of those I left hehind me, he had 

 died hefore my return. With my card of ad- 

 mission I had to search for the gardener, and I 

 found him stripped to his shirt, on the top of a 

 ladder, training the trees himself to the wall. 

 The geneml impression we have of men in these 

 high positions is that they have "gloves on their 

 hands and nothing to do." I was pleased to find 

 Mr. Todman a worker as well as an intelligent 

 well-informed gentleman — ^just the sort of man, 

 I thought, we like to have in America. 



But I must stop here, much as there was that 

 I think it would interest my readers to tell. 

 There is much I would like to say of England 

 and France which will take years to recount. I 

 must from month to month say just a little of 

 some things, and let the rest dwell only in my 

 own remembrance. 



The G.\rden of America. — Friend Chalkley 

 Gillingham claims the Susquehanna and Poto- 

 mac regions as the garden of America, and in 

 confirmation thereof gives the following figures: 

 — "The mean temperature of this region for the 

 last seven years was : for the Winter months, 

 33° 29\ Spring. 50° 47\ Summer, 76° 30' ; Au- 

 tumn, 55° 47\ The mean rain-fall for the U. S. 

 for the year ending June 30, 1876, was 45.18; for 

 Washington, D. C, it was 48.01. 'Thus we are 

 between the extremes of heat and cold, and con- 

 sequently we have the best fruit region in the 

 world.' " 



Horticulture in Kentucky and Tennessee. — 

 We had a chance to spend' a few weeks in this 

 region the past month, with Nashville for head- 

 quarters, and were delighted to find much more 

 Horticultural improvement than we expected. 

 The nursery business, as conducted by Messrs. 

 Truett's Sons and Morgan, Underbill & Newsom, 

 and Mclntyre, seemed very prosperous. Mr. Lishy 

 also, we were informed was doing well, but hap- 

 pened unfortunately to be out of our line of 

 travel. We had the chance to see the beautiful 

 private places of Dr. Cheatham, Mrs. A.V. Brown, 

 Mrs. Polk, the grounds of the Insane Asylum, 

 the Vanderbilt University and many others. At 

 this season an Editor can do little more than 



wander about and take notes for future use, but 

 the treatment accorded to the writer by his 

 Southern Horticultural friends was so kind and 

 cordial that we must make place for this note. 



The Christ's Thorn. — It is of course not 

 possible to tell exactly what plant it was of 

 which tradition says the crown of thorns was 

 made Rubens in his picture seems to have a 

 Glcditschia (our Honey Locust). Other writers 

 think it is the Ziziphus communis, the Jujube; 

 but the weight of opinion seems to settle on the 

 Paliurus aculeatus, which is a low-growing 

 thorny shrub, hardy in the Middle States of the 

 Union, except in very severe Winters. The Zizi- 

 phus is hardier than the Paliurus. 



An Enemy of the Potato Beetle. — It is stated 

 in the Field and Forest that the pld potato beetle, 

 Lema trilineata, and comparatively harmless, 

 feeds on the larvae of the Colorado Beetle. It is 

 worth confirming, as it is unusual for a herbiver- 

 ous insect to turn carniverous, though it is be- 

 lieved by some good entomologists that some of 

 the Lady Bug family, now carniverous, in past 

 ages fed on herbs. 



Transactions of the Wisconsin State Horti- 

 cultural Society, Vol. VII., from F. W. Case, 

 Sec, Madison. — An excellent volume, — excellent 

 because it does not confine itself to the cultiva- 

 tion of a single branch of Horticultural art, but 

 encourages all. There are essays — excellent ones 

 — on every department of gardening, and none 

 the worse for being generally short and to the 

 point. 



Tenth Annual Report of the Secretary of 

 the Connecticut Board of Agriculture. Print- 

 ed by the Legislature. From T. S. Gold, Secre- 

 tary, West Cornwall, Conn. Besides many 

 matters of interest, special fertilizers, manures, 

 and woods and woodlands have a conspicuous 

 place among the subjects treated of in this vol- 

 ume. 



Transactions of the Massachusetts Hort. 

 Society, Part I. From Robert Manning, Sec'y- 

 This admirable serial does honor to the Horti- 

 cultural literature of our country. The leading 

 essays and discussions in this number are on 

 road making, self and cross-fertilization, fertil- 

 izers, and squash and melon culture — the latter 

 Q,specially exhaustive of the subject. 



Orchid Grower's Manual. By B. S. Williams, 

 of Victoria Nurseries, Upper Holloway, London. 

 Fifth Edition. We are very glad to see a new 



