4G0 



JOURNAL OF HORTIGTJLTUEE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ Jane 6, 1873. 



same time let me do her the justice to say that, had she not 

 done so, it is most likely she would have adopted some other 

 plan equally effective, and that quite independently of the 

 Ferns. The simpUcity of the whole arrangement was its 

 charm. 



I am excessively sorry that this plan has received the sanc- 

 tion of the Royal Horticultural Society, but at the same time 

 I am quite convinced that it will never make way. I should 

 like to know how many persons of good position will be influ- 

 enced by the show, and say when they get home, " WeU, we 

 must have our dinner tables altered and adopt this new plan." 

 I am no diner-out, but I have never seen it attempted, and am 

 glad to find that Mr. Peach corroborates my views as to its 

 rarity. I fuhy endorse, too, all that has been said on the im- 

 propriety of such an expenditure on a matter which can in no 

 way affect the interests of horticulture. When I recollect that 

 the finest collection of plants that can be exhibited would 

 only be rewarded with halt the money, one feels forced to cry. 

 Shame on such an outlay as this ! — D., Deal. 



FOECED STBAWBEEEIES FAILING. 



Mr. Recokd asks me (" E. T. J.") what was the state of the 

 Strawberry roots at the time of being introduced into heat. 

 I answer it was very good, as that is a point I am always 

 anxious about, knowing that I can expect no good result either 

 in fruit or flower if the roots are not as they should be. I 

 have for several years protected the plants in a six-light cold 

 pit, with ail' on night and day when the state of the weather 

 would permit, and in time of frost been careful to exclude it. 

 I layer the runners, as soon as I can get them, in 3-inch pots, 

 and shift into 6-inch pots, generally the last week in .July. 

 Although my first lot was a failure, and I expected the suc- 

 cession would go the same way, since the weather has become 

 drier the disease has ceased, and the frait has swelled and 

 ripened beautifully. My third lot look as if they would be 

 better still. 



I fully beheve the failure in the first place chiefly arose from 

 the long continuance of dull wet weather, for I never remember 

 such a cold April and May as we have had this year. Some 

 years ago I Uved at a place in Yorkshu-e, where every season we 

 forced from six hundi-ed to seven hundred pots of Strawberries, 

 and as soon as they were all potted in July they were plunged 

 to the rim of the pot, and no covering of any kind was j^ut 

 over them in winter, yet they always did well. I have assisted 

 in taking them up and placing them in gentle heat at once, 

 and I do not remember a single failure. The kinds were 

 Princess Alice Maud and Keens' Seedling. 



I am much obUged for the communications on the subject, 

 as I think it desirable that gardeners should report failures as 

 well as successes, for all are Hable to such disappointments at 

 times.— E. T. J. 



GEAVENSTEIN AND DUCHESS OP 

 OLDENBUBGH APPLES. 



Can you tell me whether I am right or wi-ong in considering 

 the Gravenstein and Duchess of Oldenburgh Apples alike ? I 

 have this week been hunting through and comparing many 

 sorts in my collection, amongst them the two sorts named 

 above. In these I find no difference as regards their growth, 

 wood, and leafage ; I am therefore afraid that I have not secured 

 the two sorts, although I have tried for several years to do so. I 

 have procured trees under both names from several of the best 

 English collections ; I have also done so from the best conti- 

 nental collections, but the result has been the same — I have 

 only one sort. Whether it is the Gravensteiu or the Duchess 

 I cannot make out, and in my distress have applied to you for 

 aid. I have before me the descriptions of Thompson, Lindley, 

 Hogg, and Downing, also the description and figure of the 

 Gravensteiu in the fourth volume of the Horticultural Society's 

 " Transactions," yet I cannot decide whether the two Apples are 

 alike or not. I have never seen any figure of the Duchess ex- 

 eeptiug the one in Downing's " Fruit Trees of America "and 

 Ronalds, and the two figures are exactly aUie, which you 

 wiU see by a tracing which I send. The descriptions, too, I 

 think are so much alike that they lead me to suppose that the 

 two fruits are the same. 



Appended I quote descriptions of both fruits, and although 

 one fruit is said to be German and the other Russian, yet there 

 is a doubt about the Gravenstein being German. Some say it 

 is Itahan ; but may it not be Russian ? As the parentage is dis- 



putable it is as likely to be the last as the first ; and there is 

 this peculiarity in the Gravensteiu that makes me inclined to 

 think it of Russian origin — viz., that neai-ly, if not all trans- 

 parent Apples are of that country, and therefore my notion 

 that the Gravenstein and the Duchess of Oldenburgh are aJike. 



Description of the Gravenstein 

 by Thompson. — " Shoots strong 

 [same as my trees] dark 

 purplish red, sprinkled with 

 whitish dots ; leaves rather 

 large, broad, ovate, acuminate, 

 and serrated or acutely cre- 

 nated." As far as the above 

 goes all my trees of the so- 

 called two sorts agree, with 

 this addition, that the pubes- 

 cence and venation are aUke, 

 also that in many of the leaves, 

 from both trees, one side of the 

 expanded portion is a Httle 

 longer than the other; the 

 length of the petioles is also 

 aUke. 



Description hy Downing. 

 ^'Yonngvroodrcddish brown." 

 As the descriptions of Lindley, 

 Hogg, and Downing agree in 

 most particulars I need not 

 quote them, but merely point 

 out the discrepancies between 

 HoggandDowning. As regards 

 the Duchess, Dr. Hogg says, 

 " Eye large and closed, with 

 long broad segments, placed in 

 a deep angular basin." Down- 

 ing says, " Calyx pretty large 

 and nearly closed, set in a wide 

 even hoDow." This is the only 

 difference in description of any 

 import, and that is reduced to- 

 a minimum. 



I find that all the continental writers give August and Sep- 

 tember as the months when the two fruits are ripe (ripe here 

 in September generally). I have not been able to find a 

 coloured figure anywhere excepting Ronalds's, and this is very 

 Uke a Gravenstein. 



I do not know that I have made myself clearly understood. 

 Will you kindly give your opinion of the two fi-uits, and say ia 

 what they differ ? I may have only obtained one for both, and 

 hence my pei'plexity. — J. Scott. 



[The two Apples Duchess of Oldenburgh and Gravenstein 

 are certainly quite distinct, not only in appearance of the finiit,. 

 but in its duration. The former is a regularly shaped Apple with 

 broken streaks of red on its surface, a long slender stalk, and 

 ripens always in the middle and end of August, and rarely 

 keeps longer than September. The Gravenstein is an irregularly 

 shaped fruit, frequently knobbed round the basin of the eye,- 

 which is also higher on one side than the other. The skin is 

 covered with red on the side next the sun and streaked with 

 crimson, and aU its cells are wide open, while only some of 

 those of Duchess of Oldenburgh are so. The fruit wiU keep 

 tiU Christmas. The flavour of Gravenstein is rich and spicy,, 

 and it is in every way a superior Apple to Duchess of Olden- 

 burgh, which has Little besides itsearUness to recommend it. — 

 Eds.] 



SELF-ACTING FOUNTAIN. 



In answer to " Amateue," and other inquirers as to how » 

 self-acting fountain may be made, we reprint the following from 

 our eighteenth volume : — 



The annexed sketch 

 represents a fountain 

 30 inches high, which 

 is not very expensive or 

 difficult to make by any- 

 one who can use a " cop- 

 per bit." The top reser- 

 voir is a 14-inch galvan- 

 ised iron basin, with a 

 flat zinc cover soldered 

 on ; the centre, for about 

 4 inches diameter, slight- 

 ly sunk ; the base is a 

 zinc reservoir of larger 

 capacity than the upper 

 one ; the shaft or pillar 

 is also ofTzinc, with a 

 bead round the centre 

 by way of ornament, the 

 whole soldered toge er ; 

 the jet is the nose 

 large-sized carpen r's 

 oil-can, with a piece of 

 compo gas pipe long 

 enough to reach nearly 

 to the bottom of the bowl , 

 soldered to it ; the tube 



shown, with a sUghtly funnel top, is soldered into the cover,, 

 and passes through to within three-eighths of an inch of the 

 bottom of the lower reservoir; the only remainhig pipe is 



