170 



JOURNAL OF HOKTICULTUBE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ September 6, 1S67. 



electricity, perform important functions in vegetable physiology, 

 We must not entirely shut out our trees under glass from 

 such influences. Even acting meclianically they wash the 

 foliage clean from insects and other pests. In hot weather 

 evaporation is rapid from the whole extent of foliage, and an 

 equilibrium is soon restored between root and leaf, unless 

 under unnecessarily severe conditions. — T. Bef.haut. 



NEW, EASY, AND EFFICIENT MODE OF 

 DESTROYING WASPS. 



Wasps are now rather plentiful. I have for several years 

 adopted a very simple, but very effectual, plan of getting rid of 

 their nests. When I find a nest I select the noon of a hot 

 sunny day for my operation.'). I procure a very strong solu- 

 tion of cyanide of potassium, and I saturate a piece of lint, about 

 3 or i inches square, with the soluliou. This lint I quietly 

 place at the outlet of the hole leading to the nest on the ground, 

 in a bank, or elsewhere. Nothing more is requisite. Every 

 wasp that arrives at the hole on its descent alights on the lint, 

 and, after one or two gyrations, drops over the edge of the lint 

 into the hole, dead, or else dies upon the lint — not one escapes. 

 After sitting down by the side watching the operation for about 

 ten or fifteen minutes at most, the number of wasps arriving 

 home becomes very much lessened, and then only a few odd 

 ones arrive, I then dig out tlie nest. All are destroyed. There 

 is no fuss, no risk of being stung, as every wasp coming home 

 falls on the fatal lint, and has no escape. The evaporation of 

 the cyanide is very rapid, and the air all around the hole is 

 tainted, and the wasps seem fascinated by it, as I never see any 

 turn away ; they look as if they must settle, and when once they 

 alight they have no power to raise themselves, the use of the 

 ■wings is gone, and they are soon dead from the inhalation of 

 the cyanide. 



This is a very simple way of destroying the nest, because if 

 you do not wish to take the nest, you may leave the lint there, 

 it will destroy aU the nest, and will do no harm to anything 

 else. 



When the nest is in a tree, I generally go in the evening, and 

 hold the lint soaked in the cyanide under the bottom hole. 

 The wasps soon begin to drop out, first one by one, then in a 

 regular shower. Of course caution must be used to avoid the 

 inhalation of the cyanide, but as so little is required, it is not 

 very probable any accident will result from the proceeding. — 

 Amos BEARnsLEy, Grange, Lancashire. 



ROSES ON THE MANETTI STOCK— MARECHAL 

 NIEL ON A BRIAR STOCK. 



I WILL take the last first. I have now two plants of MarSchal 

 Niel budded on Briars growing well and beautifully. One is a 

 tall standard referred to by "D.," the other is a dwarf bought 

 of Mr. Keynes with five others, excellent specimens, having firm 

 wood averaging 44 inches. Four of the Briars have died this 

 summer from winter injury, the other is alive — scarcely alive. 

 It is not the fault of the Marechal. It is my fault. I wished 

 to try the hardiness of the Marechal, and so I did not tie it 

 up when the first frost set in, but I did so before the second 

 frost, but it was too late. I consider it a very hardy yellow 

 Rose, and the Briar a suitable stock. I have the mother 

 (Isabella Gray), on its own roots in the open champagne, a 

 strong-growing stalwart tree with two buds. I am interested 

 to see them bloom side by side. Jly two successful plants of 

 the Marechal are neither of them against a south wall — the 

 best place. One is 6 feet from a south wall, and the other 

 6 feet in front of my little vinery. I shall probably move them 

 to a south wall, or at any rate buy some for the purpose. 

 However good a yellow Rose may be in the open ground, it 

 will be better under a south wall, and more golden. I do not 

 remember advising (page 162), " Humble Cottaoee," to plant 

 MarSchal Niel. It is at any rate a mistake. I meant to write 

 Marechal Vaillant. In passing, I may mention, " D." brought 

 here two perfectly golden blooms of Bouton d'Or, as golden 

 outside as in — gems of great beauty, but not very large. 



Now, a few words about the " Briar, I'ersus Manetti." " D.," 

 of Deal, has said just what I should have said had I noticed 

 Mr. Cant's observations. Mr. Taylor lives at Fencote, Bedale, 

 Yorkshire, just ask him his experience of the " enduring 

 nature of a Briar stock," as compared with a Manetti Rose, 



during the winters of 1860 and 1866. He lives in the fine vale 

 of Mowbray, perfectly adapted to Briar Rosea. 



I have always found the Briar an admirable stock for sum- 

 mer Roses and Tea-scented Noisettes, both of which do 

 equally well, or better, on Manetti or their own roots, and are 

 more easily defended on them. It is fair to say that Rosea 

 may be grown well on a Briar in sandy or chalky soil, provided 

 people will go to a great extra expense. 



Now, one word for " Beta." I do not advise inexperienced 

 persons to move Roses, especially travelled Roses, so early as 

 I have done. " Beta " left out the word Manetti before Roses, 

 which seems to make me advise the practice for all kinds of 

 Roses. Now, with regard to the fresh-planted Manetti Roses. 

 I bought on the 5th of August last, 285 Manetti Roses, and 

 Mr. Gill gave me three plants over, making 288. They have 

 all taken, Louise Margottin is in complete new foliage ex- 

 panded, and all will be new-foliaged within a mouth, and I 

 expect to bloom many of them, at least some, this fall. Surely 

 I need not say that I never write on any subject that which I 

 do not believe to be most strictly veracious. — W. F. Radolyffe, 

 Fwse Hill. 



ABOUT THE LAND'S END.— No. 3. 



I HAVE found in the old Cornish language more than usual 

 attractions, as the readers of "our Journal" may have ap- 

 preciated from my frequent recurrence to that language's voca- 

 bularies. It is not merely because some of the names of our 

 fruits and plants are traceable to it, nor because it is melo- 

 dious — on the contrary, it is harsh and rough, but it is because 

 its epithets and proper names are so very much more appro- 

 priate and expressive than o(ir own. Take, for example, the 

 names of the months. No names can be more inapplicable 

 and destitute of meaning than those by which wo distinguish 

 them. Thus, on what possible foundation can a Briton justify 

 calling the past month August? It was all very well for a 

 Roman to do so, as he wished to propitiate an emperor. More- 

 over, why should we still call four months the seventh, eighth, 

 ninth, and tenth, when they are in truth the ninth, tenth, 

 eleventh, and twelfth? Our Cornish forefathers adopted a 

 nomenclature which could not be so disorganised, unless by 

 some convulsion our globe's axis was changed. They called 

 January, Mh-ijen vcr, the cold-air month ; February, Miz- 

 Hiievral, the whirlwind month ; March, Mh-merli, the hor.se 

 month ; April, iliz-Khrall, the Primrose month ; May, Miz- 

 vie, the flowery month ; June, Miz-Ephan, the summer month ; 

 July, Jliz-ijor-epkan, the chief summer month; August, Miz- 

 east, the harvest month ; September, Miz-ijwedu gala, the 

 white straw month ; October, Miz-hcdra, the watery month ; 

 November, Miz-diu, the black month ; and Miz-liorardiu, the 

 month next after the black. 



One of the objects attracting me to St. Michael's Mount was 

 to see Opie's portrait of the last talker of this language, Dolly 

 Peutreath, but it is gone. Murray's Handbook (l look upon 

 Murray as almost infallible) says it was there in 1865, Where is 

 it now ? On another day I journeyed to St. Paul, in the God's 

 Acre of which parish Dolly's bones are stored. In the wall of 

 that enclosure a stone is inserted, to the memory of Dolly, and 

 its inscription is in English and Cornish. It bears the date of 

 its erection, too, 18C0, and contains two mysteries, for which I 

 have sought explanation vainly. Why did Prince Louis Lucien 

 Buonaparte co-operate with the vicar in erecting that stone ? 

 And why was the twelfth verse of the 20th chapter of Exodus 

 inscribed upon it? She was not their mother, nor is it even 

 known whether she was any one's mother ?• 



Although Cornish is altogether abandoned as a spoken lan- 

 guage, many of its words are still mingled with English by the 

 peasantry. Thus, in journeying from St. Paul towards the 

 Land's End, noticing a Mountain Ash, I inquired what the 

 Cornubians call it, and found that they name it the Cair tree, 

 literally " the berry tree." 



Among the very few shrubs at the Land's End — there are no 

 trees there — I noticed the Tamarisk, and Fuchsia Biccartonii, 

 but the latter was stag-headed, for the Atlantic galea i^yiK^i over 

 it so soon as it peered above the granite blocks which formed 

 the low garden wall. Even the taller Furze (Ulex europrous) 

 is absent from the soil strewed with granite blocks, as it sown 

 broadcast by a giant, but the dwarf Furze (U. nana) is abun- 

 dant, is now in full bloom, and not higher than the Heaths 

 among which it is crowded. 



* One of the priuterB in onr office st'ites that hie grnndmothor's pistor's 

 husband w»9 Dolly Pentreath'g grandson.— Eds. 



