1876.] 



AND HOMTIGULTURIST. 



219 



and we have now before us his annual catalogue 

 of near two hundred pages, aflbrding a chance 

 for any one to find some novelty to his taste. 

 And here we take up another catalogue of a sim- 

 ilar class from the well-known firm of James 

 Vietch & Son, also of Chelsea. But we must 

 stop, for here is another from Linden, of Brussels. 

 Mr. W. T. Harding. — We are gratified to learn 

 from some friends at Upper Sandusky, Ohio, 

 that our excellent contributed, as skilled in prac- 

 tical work as he is intelligent behind his pen, 



has been spending the spring and summer in 

 designing and laying out a cemetery at that 

 place, and that the result is " very beautiful and 

 acceptable work, at a comparatively low cost." 

 This is after all the true test of a skillful master 

 of the art of gardening. There is nothing so dear 

 as a cheap " bungler," and nothing more unsatis- 

 fiictory when the work is done. We hope Mr. 

 Harding will get more of the same sort this fall, 

 to the profit of his own and to the interest 

 of those who may employ him. 



taORTlCULTURAL fSOCIETIES. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



Flora at the Centekxial — May. — The great 

 floral feature at the Centennial for May was Mr. 

 Waterer's Rhododendrons. A house was built 

 for these by the Centennial authorities, like a 

 huge curvilinear conservatory, only covered with 

 canvas instead of glass. Mr. Waterer arranged 

 the ground inside in what is known to gardeners 

 as the " Eegent's Park style." In some places 

 the earth was raised so as to be several feet 

 above the natural level, forming a "bluff," 

 around which a walk would be led, and then 

 again were levels and rises, with narrow grass 

 verges and broad, sanded walks, the Rhododen- 

 drons thickly planted in the beds, and the»whole 

 forming a delightful piece of landscape garden- 

 ing. There were fifteen hundred plants in about 

 eighty varieties in the collection, and we think it 

 is safe to say that nothing ever exhibited in a 

 floral way in the United States attracted so 

 much attention or received such unqualified 

 admiration. The house was crowded from morn- 

 ing to evening, and many visitors who found 

 themselves unexpectedly among so much floral 

 beauty telegraphed to their distant friends to 

 come right on, and see the glorious sight. It 

 was evident that although all the leading Ameri- 

 can nurserymen have been for years endeavor- 

 ing to introduce Rhododendron culture, not one 

 in a hundred of the thousands of visitors here 

 ever saw one before, and the influence on their 

 introduction will be immense. 



But not only to the great multitude was this a 

 great lesson, but all of us found much to learn 



from the great exhibit of so many varieties all 

 blooming here together. We fancy that few ever 

 took into consideration how great is the diversity 

 of form and habit among these plants, as well as in 

 the form, color and markings of the flowers ; yet 

 to those making collections of these beautiful 

 things such points will enter largely into the sys- 

 tem of selection. Some make long straggling 

 growths, while others have a dense, compact 

 habit. Some kinds perhaps making specimens 

 four or five feet high would have but a dozen or 

 so of heads of flowers, while other varieties 

 wcfhld have half a hundred in plants of the same 

 size. Then there is a great difference in the 

 shape of the heads — some kinds having them aa 

 round as an orange, and others cone-like, as in 

 a pine-apple. Some kinds have rather short 

 pedicels to the flowers, and then the head is 

 compact, while others are long, and then the 

 head is loose. So in number. There are kinds 

 which will have nearly double the quantity of 

 flowers in a head that others will. All these and 

 similar points enter largely into the sum total of 

 pleasure to be derived from a collection of Rho- 

 dodendrons, and no doubt many of them were 

 noted in the memorandum books of the visitors, 

 which we were pleased to see in common use. 



It is generally known that the Rhododendron 

 is an " American plant," and people wonder why 

 Americans cannot grow one of their own articles 

 as good as Europeans. It is not as generally 

 known that these garden forms are hybrids be- 

 tween the American species and the Rhododen- 

 dron ponticum, and perhaps in some cases R. 

 arboreum, which have a much tenderer consti- 



