A FEW WORDS ABOUT SICKLY PEAR-TEEE8. 



system, ami is never deeoni posed or removed by perspiration, in tlie requisite 

 dep:ree. In short, ])lants irrowinj? fast by nifj^ht, can neither rijien tlieir wood 

 nor form their inner strneture well, and, therefore, they are inca])al)le of developinf^ 

 their natnral beauty, or of resisting those extremes of temperature which are 

 natural to them. 



That frreenhouses oujrht not to be lieatcd at nitrht more than is sufficient to 

 exclude the frost, is certain ; that, if j^roperly ))repared, )»lants will bear frost, is 

 also in(lisputai»le, as, indeed, is proved by tlie camellias, Chinese azaleas, and 

 other plants, which are kept in cold frames through the hardest winters, and where 

 they thrive far better than in greenhouses. 



"With stove plants it is different ; experiments are needed to determine how 

 ranch cold they will bear at night. There seems to be no douljt that the colder 

 they can be safely kept, the better for their health. A celebrated gardener assures 

 me that he keeps his stove plants, during the winter months, at no higher tempe- 

 rature than from 40° to 50° ; it is true,iiis employer desires late-blooming plants, 

 but he has the roof covered with creeping stove plants, including Cambretums, 

 Bignonias, PassiHoras, Stejihanotis, &c. When the warm days of spring return, 

 they l)reak with unusual vigor, enjoying, as they do, almost a natural climate ; his 

 Bignonia venusta is covered with i)loom, and the Stephanotis blooms in July — the 

 Passilloras throughout the year. 



These facts are deeply interesting, and may serve for hints to those gardeners 

 whose employers reside in the city in winter; they may have a gay house when 

 the family returns in the spring. 



A FEW WORDS ABOUT SICKLY PEAR-TREES. 



BY THE LATE A. J. DOWNING. 



I FIND, on looking about my garden, talking with fruit growers, and looking 

 through the pages of your paper, that it is an undeniable fact, that a good deal 

 more difficulty is exi)erienced in cidtivating the pear than any other of the popular 

 fruit-trees. 



The time was, indeed, when pear-trees — great, strong, lofty trees, too, though 

 the fruit was rather clwkcy — grew around every farm-house, bore cart-loads of 

 fruit annually, and were looked u]>on as able to " stand more hard knocks" than 

 even an apple-tree. Longer lived the pear-tree certainly is, by nature; and, as 

 standing veneral)le proofs of this, I refer you to the Endicott Pear-tree, near 

 Salem, and the Stuyvesant Pear-tree, in New York. As both of these trees are 

 above two centuries old — by veritable records — it is not worth while to spend 

 time in proving that the pear is, naturally, a long-lived tree. 



But, in fact, natural pear-trees — that is to say, the chance seedlings of the com- 

 mon pear that spring up by the sides of lanes and fences — are as hardy and as 

 great l)earers now as they ever were. What, then, is the matter with all the sorts 

 whose tenderness our fruit growers groan over ? 



Is it not owing to the delicate constitutions which these foreign varieties, bred 

 in a more regular climate, have, and which makes them peculiarly alive to our 

 great excesses of heat and cold ? 



Is it not true, in rich and deep soils, where delicate trees are forced into a sappy 

 condition, when the limbs are too full of juices, upon which the frost or sun acts 

 readily, that blight and other diseases of the pear are most frequent ? 



it not true that foreign varieties of pear, especially those originated wi 



