DOMESTIC NOTICES. 



149 



sauce, bechamel; Parsley, verd de persil, and a 

 stew, a ragout, a godard, or a chambord ; while 

 pea soup and stuffinji are elevated to the honors of 

 puree and farces. Can any thinjr be more ridieu- 

 lous? and yet the seedsman Is driven, liy the abso- 

 lute necessity of his position, to similar devices. 

 And not dishonestly either. He feels that the evil 

 is not of his own creation ; that the practice is 

 forced upon him, and that if he does not adopt it, 

 his custom will desert him ; and therefore he gjets 

 hold of some very <jood old variety, claps upon it a 

 new name, duly advertises it, and lo! his desk is 

 loaded with orders, and he at once becomes a man 

 of enterprise and skill. 



" A kind of cabbage, or rather winter green, is 

 purchaseable under the name of ' Jerusalem Kale.' 

 (Siberian is the neio name.) Nothing can be bet- 

 ter. It is perfectly hardy, and forms a most deli- 

 cious vegetable, if sent to table dressed like aspar- 

 agus it is doubtful if an esculent of more real 

 excellence exists among us. It was described in 

 the Transactions of the Horticultural Society near- 

 ly thirty years ago. Its value was pointed out by 

 the late Mr. Wkdgwood, who blanched it like sea- 

 kale, and found it an admirable substitute for the 

 latter, to which it is in our mind superior ; but no- 

 body grows it now-a-days, because lit is not called 

 a novelty, puffed and made the subject of exaggera- 

 tion. If we ask what it has do with Jerusalem, 

 (or Siberia,) we shall be puzzled to find the con- 

 nection, the more especially since its claims are 

 equal to a Prussian. Russian. Hungarian, (Buda,) 

 and Manchester origin, for it has successively borne 

 all these names. 



" It is but another example of the advantage of 

 substituting new and fine names for old familiar 

 ones. Had any body attempted to sell it as a very 

 good kind of Collard or Colewort, he would not 

 have found a customer ; or if he did, it would have 

 been at the price of rapeseed ; but a foreign origin 

 WHS given it, with a fine sounding name, and a de- 

 mand was created ; new markets were succes- 

 sively obtained by other new names, but now in- 

 genuity is exhausted, and it does not sell. Nobody 

 grows Jerusalem Kale. Yet if it were properly 

 advertised under the name of Hierosolymatanian 

 Kale, and an ingenious fable were circulated about 

 its having been found in a Pacha's garden on Le- 

 banon, we engage to say that the demand would 

 become enormous. The sale would be doub ed if 

 it bore the name of Ptolemaic Kale, and were 

 shown to have been found in the folds of a mummy, 

 so that its pedigree might be traced up to the pot- 

 tage of the Pharoahs. 



" Shrewd Mr. Cobbett found the value of these 

 devices, when he discovered that the specious name 

 of locust tree, and a flourishing account of its ex- 

 cellence, would prodoce him a crown, while the 

 nurseyman could only get sixpence for the same 

 thing, which he was simple enough to sell under 

 the old name of Acacia." 



CoBBETT certainly was a cunning fellow, and 

 has many imitators on this side of the Atlantic. 

 To be successful in these times of ' progress,' one 

 must be' wideawake,' and not particularly squeam- 

 ish in practicing all sorts of humbug. — Wm. W. 

 Valk, M. D. Flushing, L. I., Aug. «, 1848. 



[This vegetable is at least very little known or 

 cultivated in tiiis country, and as early spring veg- 

 etables are especially desirable, we thank Messrs. 

 Thorburn for a parcel of its seeds, received by 

 them from abroad, under the double name of" Ger- 

 man Greens'^ or " Siberian Kale." — Ed.] 



Belle M^gnifique Cherry. — lam glad to see 

 you have placed this famous cherry in its proper 

 rank. It has borne with us for three or four years, 

 and has never failed to be large, beautiful and fine. 

 The tree is very hardy and productive, — adapting 

 it well to cold climates. It is decidedly the best, to 

 our taste, of the late acid cherries ; as it not only 

 cooks well, but when fully ripe, is highly relished 

 by many for the dessert. On the Mahaleb stock, it 

 makes a beautiful prolific garden tree. Yours, 

 P. Barry. Rochester, N. Y., August l8th. 18 18. 



Gl^m Shellac Solution. — Dear Sir: I have^ 

 tried your varnish of gum shellac and spirits of 

 wine for pruning trees, (Hort., vol. 2, p. 533,) and 

 fully agree with all that your Philadelphian says in 

 its iavor. 



I have also to add, that in crown grafting, I have 

 found it a j)erfcct substitute for all bandages and 

 other compositions. I have tried it with peaches, 

 apples and pears, and have also succeeded in graft- 

 ing a few sorts of roses with it, which before 1 had 

 never been able to do in a single instance. I com- 

 menced spring budding on the 2nd of March, and 

 have never at any season been more successful. I 

 have always headed off" to an inch above the bud 

 and stripped off' every limb and leaf, both below 

 and above at the time of insertion. Yours, respect- 

 fully. Robert Chisholm. Beaufort, S. C, July 20. 



Magnolia Grandiflora. — We have examined 

 this spring prett}' thoroughly into the matter of 

 " double," or " semi-double" varieties of this mag- 

 nolia, and this is the result. No flower that I can 

 find has more than 9 petals, but other trees grow- 

 ing in the immediate vicinity of these, bear flowers 

 with only five or six petals. In the grove which 

 Mr. M. and I searched, we thought the majority of 

 the trees bore flowers with 9 petals. What culti- 

 vation wili do remains yet to be seen. I measured 

 one of the buds of the last mentioned, and found it 

 more than seven inches in length and four in 

 breadth, just before the petals began to unfold. 

 This is quite a common size, but those with fewer 

 petals are usually smaller every way, both in leaf 

 and flower. The scent is heavy, less agreeable 

 perhaps than the swamp magnolia of the north, as 

 much so as the night-blooming Jasmine, (Cestrum,) 

 is to the common white. The tree grows rapidly. 

 Some seedlings of mine, that a year ago were only 

 four or five inches high, are now four feet. Anoth- 

 er plant is 5 1-2 feet and finely branched. I do not 

 think this tree casts its leaves until it begins to 

 bloom. Then when all other trees in the forest 

 are putting on their summer robes, the ground is 

 covered with the fallen leaves of the magnolia 

 grandiflora, and the tree looks poor and ragged as 

 white flowers begin to unfold. Before the flowers 

 are over, however, it wears a very different aspect 

 — the bright green leaves already clothing it, and 

 forming the richest back ground for the remaining 



