JOUENAL OF HOETlcULTtmE ASD COff AGS GAIIDeNEE. 



[ June i'l, 1872. 



52i 



hurst), quite ripe (June 16th). It is a proUfio sort-large, 

 handsome, and of good flavour.— Obserteb. 



PLANT NEIGHBOUBS OF NICE. 



T VM not sure that it is worth while noting for you the few 

 hltStermCSSyintoIheBu'bject, and I wiU only venture 



r-havm of TOur pages, and which leadb us aU to leei as ii ij., 

 nf T)^al the '' WS.TRHIEE Eectob," and many others who love 

 l?ts were often sitting .-ith us, carelessly talkrng over the tea 

 ? ble of what we have most admired m our walks. 

 To be^n with the OUve, snubbed by many travellers as being 

 io be_gin wiiu I ^...jgjj' ^-een colour. I think it a vei-y hand- 

 *°^nT,ee^nd toowTotliing more beautiful than a landscape 

 wZ the blue M«hterranean^ the gieen com fields red rocks, 

 rndVforest of Olives, which, as the breeze rises or faUs changes 

 Cm sombie grey to the bright silvei-j' tint whrch the under 

 ^irof the leaves gives. What stiiick me most as v-'mtY. noting 

 is its peciiJiai deplndance on the immediate neighbourhood of 

 IS Its pecimai u i. Florence and elsewhere, the 



the sea. 1?*^,^"°/^°°* t toe ^°°S the Riviera, as at San 



H inches hTghT^ere may be some higher trees m that forest, 

 b incnes mgn. /• J ^ ^ ^ taken as the average 



but ,7* f "^>'at,tot The OUve trees here are too much 

 ^''^ fl.fl toXer to show much beauty of form, but in the 

 crowded togethei to "i°^ ^ J^ ^ sufficient distance 



^" f [nTbow out as fine formsls any of the Oak andEhn hedge- 

 ''^'''./. Fnclnd and mowto great sizes. They diminish m 

 rows m Englana, ana gio | ^ Toulon to Marseilles, 



F^nTllarsers^n the Iftbank oTthe Rhone they flourish, but 



-S^uTaTytl^^^^^^^ 



Rhine t^ards the Me'^^terranean they will scarcely live They 

 are seen IlTUggling not much larger than Gooseberry bushes, 

 and I s^w whole fiflds killed to the gi'oimd They reappear as 

 fine tree! Though not to be compared to those on the Riviera 

 1 t M™tT,pli?r and Cette, but disappear entirely when the 

 SA^ane^af IS left behincl on the route to Carcassone. This 



'-^'t^:T^^°^^^^^ tr- in the south 

 of France Except for the production of tar it seems to be one 

 of the least valuable of the Pines. It is of low growth; and 



m i!tf rr^vprs a rrreatpart of the /o«rfcs of Bordeaux, it seems 

 ^ t.°nie sStedto^ougritas the Scotch Fir. I allude to it 

 torn tie melancholy spectacle that I saw along the railway 

 tiom tne meuiu^ j Cnme siv vears ago, when I last passed 



W^'l'atoSeYtr vast w"rk of 'plantifg'these desert L,.?e. 

 there, i aomixeu ^ . g fa,, as eve could reach, on each 



swf ttse'pine w\S^" rordfast orplanted fro 

 sicte tnese i lues flourishing condition, some of the plant- 



in Unes, and f ^^™°/J„ ?57eet iiWi. When I last passed they 

 ^*'°"', t'rilaSTad Thev seemed to have died last year, large 

 were "'=^^1? ^ ''|f ii,,^ ha^ been burnt ; but it was not so, the 

 c';;ii'es' s?m hfn-. on the^dead branches. I could see nothing to 

 Lt for tM? failure. Had it been the roots reaching some 

 Xebecls 0^ bad subsoU the youngest trees would not have 



VI cT w»1l n% the oldest I suppose that water must have lam 

 died as ^ ell as the west ^ U ^^^^ ^.^ ^^,^^ j^^ar some 



kiUed ?y t"^ .y';'; bptter success. Then Le Monnier, physician 



■ ?^Li,cH™s of late years has been that of the Eucalyptus, or 

 lutroduct ons ot late jea ^^ ^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^^ 



Austraban Gum •^'?^;^^^/„J=',o„ietimes 9 feet in the season. 

 ?have"a s cto'ofa trfe onl/nine years planted which i. 2 feet 

 I nave a °e"^?" fprence and the wood is exceedingly bard. 



toe from powder. When first shooting out they have eyeiT 

 1,„,1P nf rid and pui-ple hues, and are very ornamental W hat 

 pmTose of nXo is^ effected by this change of leaf I cannot 



imagine. We are accustomed to suppose that the HoUy lo.,iug 

 its prickles where it shoots above the reach of cattle is because 

 Nature does not grow prickles where not of use. ..I^.^rhaps some 

 AustraUan reader may supply some reason for this change in 

 the Eucalyptus. 



The next tree that arrests one's attention in the neighbourhood 

 of Nice is the Schinus moUe, or False Pepper Tree. It grows 

 to a large size-about 40 feet high, and with its hght pinnate 

 olfageisoneof the most gi-aceful of trees -^"* *Sf ,^ "t l,!lu 

 what give a quite oriental character to Nice. Althoughjudl 

 known of old in the Palm forest of Bordighera and alpng hat 

 part of the Riviera, they are of comparatively modern introduc- 

 tion into the town'andlnvirons of Nice. They are "o^ e™^- 

 where along the promenades and in the gardens arouiid Nice. 

 They transplant them from Bordighera, often P^'^S iSOf 2' ° "r 

 tree and they seem to bear removal admirably, fhey flowei 

 and beai f ruit^ but do not ripen it. The Date Palm is the com- 

 monest, and its long raceme of yeUowfrmtis very ornamen al. 

 There are good specimens of the Sago Palm hut not manj. 

 There is said to be' only one male plant of the Date P^ i° "^^ 

 neighbourhood of Nice, and it is in the garden of the Villa 

 Bacquis behind the EngUsh church. One of "^e best Palm 

 ti-ees is in the Rue St. Etienne. It has a stem 28 feet b inches 

 high to the springing of the leaves, and to the top 11 feet b inches. 

 I do not think there are many higher. „ .• „ „„,i 



There is one veiy fine specimen of the Cedi-us atlantica and 

 I beUeve the only one in that district of Nice. It is a very beau- 

 tiful tree, ^ith a straight clean stem of 27 feet and then a fine 

 spreading head, making the "t^me height o9 feet .the guth 

 at 4 feet from the gi-ound, 6 feet b inches. The two best speci- 

 mens of the Ilex I saw were at the convent of Cumez which 

 are supposed to be of gi'eat age. Their girth at 4 feet, is 8 feet 

 4 inches one, and 8 feet the other ; height only 50 feet b"* t^ey 

 are veiy wide-spreading trees. The Phytolacca is ^^^h phmtcd 

 gi-ows very vigorously along the seashore, and is theie on the 

 Promenade des Anglais, headed every season, and makes long 

 vigorous shoots in the summer. ,n„ „f w,v.o 



Another of the most graceful trees on the P^-penade of N ce 

 is the Tamarisk, which is grown as a standard alternating with 

 Phytolaccas and Palms, and forms "^ery beautiful heaths of lasp- 

 beiiy-cream-coloured flowers. One of the most stnkrng and 

 beautiful of the trees is the Carouba or Ceratouia sihqua, the 

 long bean-Uke fruit of which is used for feeding horses it s a 

 very beautiful evergi-een, with close dark gi-een foliage, not unlike 

 sonie smooth-leavecl Hollies. It seems to flourish out fiom the 

 cre^-ices of rocks where nothing else ^oiUd gi-ow On a steep 

 precipice in the neighbourhood of Mentone I found on5 o d t,ee 

 the stem of which, from the nature of the gi-ound, I could not 

 accurately measure, but estimated it about 12 feet m circum- 



*^Those plants that struck me as new to us -"-to Ji^'e farther 

 north, aie the Araucaria or Colj-mbea excelsa, which gro^^s 

 rapidly, and flourishes in a situation fully exposed to the sea 

 at the ViUa Gasteau, now caUed Les Palmiers, at ^'^e J «st^: 

 mated the height of two of these perfect trees gi-owmg ^-Jthout 

 having lost a branch, and in the most vigorous niannei, at from 

 30 to 40 feet high. Tliese gardens, upon which a l^an^f^ of the 

 name of Gasteau had lavished enormous sums of "loney on 

 works executed in the worst possible taste, contain some of the 

 finest points of view in the neighbourhood of Nice ^nd some ot 

 the rarest trees. M. Gasteau having naturaUy f J.e< ' ^^'^ Pl/^^ 

 was bought by a Dutchman, who is dmdmg it ifo separate 

 viUas. I had fortunately walked in at the open gate and seen 

 the most of the garden, when I was told that visitors ^eie "ot 

 allowed in. and. of course, retreated at once, and wr-ote a note to 

 the proprietor, asking his leave to wa.lk through agam, as i 

 wished to observe the height and make sl^etf '^'V °* ■"'Xde 

 these trees, but got so peremptoiT a refusal that I can only allude 

 to the height of the Araucaria excelsas by gue.ss. One V^^ 

 struck me Is curious, that wherever I saw the ^f ,';^<^'"-'f,\^^": 

 cata, which flourishes so weU here, it seemed not to flourish at 

 all there, and the Coljmibea Cunmnghami seemed also very 

 struggUng. The RusseUa juncea gi'ows m the Jaidm P"bhque 

 at MeltoSe to about 12 feet high; but a rather similar plant the 

 Casuariua equisetifoha, seems to flounsh at <^annes in a most 

 remarkable manner, gi-owing 18 inches m the yea^;- and looking 

 as flourishing as a yoSng Larch tree. In Algf la they giow nto 

 timber trees^ I ™s sSrprised not to see the Catalpa w^ch 

 scents the air of Como, and the Panlo^Tiia, of^vhich I s.iw at 

 Tours a large tree covered with beautiful and f'-fgrarit fioweis 

 and both of which would, doubtless, flourish on *ese shoies ot 

 the Mediterranean. The Austrahan Acacias grow to a gi eat 

 size longifolia is the most common ; and I saw at Cannes tne 

 Camphor Laurel in perfect health and 12 feet high. 



Let us now tm-n to the shrubs which are more or less of an 

 exotic character with us, and which stnke the toimst as^naost 

 remarkable for beauty. Fu-st comes the Wiganlia, which is 

 treated as an annual in the neighbourhood of Pa"!;;°^^^"^and 

 a greenhouse plant. I saw plants of it 10 to 12 feet high, and 

 spreading over 15 feet, covered with its beautiful pui-ple floveis, 



