Jannary 6, 1870. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



water — fines from first goiDg out as an apprentice to gardening, 

 and hot water since 1827, I may be allowed to give an opinion. 

 My practice always led me to the conclusion that for houses 

 where it is only required to keep greenhouse plants at a 

 temperature of from 35° to 40°, or for detached houses for 

 Peaches, &c, where forcing is only required two or three 

 months in the year, the flue has the advantage both in the 

 first outlay and in the subsequent management. For the last 

 few years my practice has not been very extensive, as I only 

 have at present two small houses 30 feet in length, and 13 feet 

 wide, with a pit 3 feet wide against the front of one house, all 

 heated by a flue after heating a hot-water boiler for my pro- 

 pagating pit. The flue goes along the front of both houses, 

 heating at the same time the 3-feet pit, when it returns, and 

 passes along the west end of the house to the chimney at the 

 back, thus traversing a distance of about 70 feet, and I have 

 found it sufficient to exclude frost for the last three years. — J. P. 



CHEAP RAILWAY TICKETS to HORTICULTURAL 

 AND OTHER SHOWS. 

 I wish to suggest, that the Royal Horticultural Society and 

 other associations should try to make arrangements with rail- 

 way companies to grant a third-class pass at a reasonable sum 

 to the thousands like myself who might have a chance of 

 visiting some of those grand floral displays in which they take 

 so deep an interest. My idea is, that parties wishing to travel 

 to any particular show should first obtain the signature of the 

 station-master, which would be a security to the company 

 against fraud, and then obtain their pass, a boon of which 

 many would avail themselves and thus benefit the company 

 without causing them the least additional expense. — J. Wither- 

 spoon. 



THE LATE MR. WILLIAM BARNES AS A 

 FLORICULTURAL JUDGE. 



There are few names amongst my horticultural friends that 

 I should have been less willing to see in the list of our losses 

 than William Barnes of Camberwell. True, my acquaintance 

 with him was not very great, we met only a few times in each 

 year, but these meetings were always pleasuiable ones. I was 

 never at his nursery, and as of late years he did not exhibit I 

 know nothing of his prowess as a plantsman ; but I can well 

 believe that his nursery was carried on in the very best manner, 

 and from all I have ever heard he had few rivals as a plant- 

 grower. Of his private life I know nothing, but of his capacity 

 in the one character in which 1 did know him I had the very 

 highest opinion — he was to my mind a model judge. 



1, He was painstaking to a degree ; some judges are satisfied 

 with a mere general look at collections, either of plants or cut 

 flowers. We know that a clever exhibitor can, by putting a 

 plant or two prominently forward, or even placing a few supe- 

 rior blooms in sight, attract the eye, and give an appearance to 

 the exhibit that it does not possess on closer examination. 

 Nothing of this kind ever satisfied him. Every plant was gone 

 through in detail, and if it had been grown one-sided so as to 

 eaten the eye it never passed muster with him. So with cut 

 blooms. I have often judged Roses with him, and each bloom 

 was examined separately, as it ought to be always, and not 

 until they had been gone over two or three times was his de- 

 cision given. Another instance of his painstaking was this : 

 He had sometimes to judge new Roses ; when he did so he 

 never came without his list of the two or three years preceding, 

 not trusting to his memory alone, so that no older flower should 

 intrude into the box, and this painstaking preceded all his 



2, He was utterly fearless. Like every judge, he was often 

 accused by weak and narrow-minded exhibitors of partiality and 

 ignorance ; but neither the discontented exhibitor, the covetous 

 exhibitor, nor the envious exhibitor ever gained much by their 

 complaining to him. A few caustic words pleasantly said gene- 

 rally, in vulgar parlance, "shut them up;" and he held it as 

 a cardinal maxim that a judge had never any right to reconsider 

 his decision, unless in some clear case of omission, as where a 

 a box or collection had been put on one side and not been 

 included. 



3, He was utterly merciless on all humbug. Woe be to the 

 exhibitor who plugged a Dahlia, added foliage to a Rose, or 

 manipulated a pot plant where he had to judge, as no eye so 

 soon detected it, and no one ever escaped a " disqualified " 

 who attempted any of these things where he was concerned. 



I would add to this that he was possessed of a dry and caustic 

 humour, which made him a most pleasant companion. In our 

 little meetings at the Crystal Palace after our judging was over 

 we ever rejoiced to see him among us. His pungent remarks 

 on the many attempts to humbug the public, his long know- 

 ledge of men and things connected with horticulture "often 

 kept the table in a roar ;" and I feel quite sure that in looking 

 forward to our gatherings there again this season we shall all 

 feel that a blank has been made which will not, nay, cannot, 

 be filled up, for although I know many kind, good, excellent 

 men in the horticultural world, I knew but one William Barnes. 

 — D., Deal. 



THE MISERIES OF A FRUIT-CULTIVATOR. 



I ah in great distress. I have done a deed which cannot be 

 undone. Pray hear me patiently. 



I am an amateur gardener with a small garden and a small 

 greenhouse. I started fairly, as I thought. I procured my fruit 

 trees from the Chilwell Nurseries — beautiful trees, properly 

 trained. I planted them myself — I did as I was told, I spread 

 out the roots, and nailed the trees up the wall, and I expected 

 fruit ; but the trees began to grow very large, and, as I thought, 

 awkwardly ; so I cut out the large shoots, as I was given to 

 understand it was the small shoots which bore the fruit. Well, 

 time went on — that is, three or four years, and I still kept 

 down the large shoots, which every year seemed to grow larger ; 

 the small shoots would not come. I was greatly perplexed, 

 for my wall room was becoming less, and I saw a prospect of 

 my trees overshadowing my neighbour's garden. 



Well, I called in the doctor — i.e., a man who said he was a 

 gardener, had served his time at Stoneleigh Abbey, and could 

 do anything. I thought he was just the man I wanted, so I 

 took him to look at my trees. "Ah!" said he, "your trees 

 have all tap roots." Tap roots ! thought I, what can they be? 

 However, he was not long in showing me, for he at once set 

 about digging up the trees, or nearly so, and we both together 

 commenced sawing off and chopping away the large roots. I 

 confess to have felt some misgivings at the time, for it seemed 

 to me like cutting off a man's legs to improve his walking ; but 

 I said nothing, I only thought all the more. Well, after we 

 had cut away nearly all the roots, of course we then cut away 

 a good many of the large branches, as I was informed to cor- 

 respond with the roots. Dear me ! thought I, this looks like 

 walking in a circle, but this gardener knows what he is doing ; 

 and so my poor trees, after suffering such awful amputations, 

 were duly nailed to the wall. 



And now I was to look for fruit. The spurs would come out 

 first, and then the bloom, and then the fruit. Well, that 

 sounded all right. But lo ! to my horror those large branches 

 began to grow again. I saw no spurs, no bloom, no fruit. I 

 thought Nature must have intended me for a timber merchant. 

 This was last summer. I spoke to a friend of mine in my 

 distress, and he actually told me I ought to be hanged, for I 

 had been murdering my trees. I thought of my gardener, and 

 felt disposed to say he was the man. My friend said my trees 

 were spoilt, and that I had better never have touched them ; 

 he said also there is no hope of these trees for a long time to 

 come, and then they will be very ugly. He recommended me 

 to try again with some fresh trees, and take Glenny's " Guide " 

 for my adviser, and let common sense have some little influ- 

 ence.' I have read a chapter or two in " Every Man His Own 

 Gardener," and I find I have been too free with the knife, saw, 

 and hatchet. So, Messrs. Editors, I am going to try again.— 

 Greenhorn. 



[We sympathise sincerely with you on the untimely fate of 

 your fruit trees, and the pitiful result of your attempts in fruit 

 culture — a result, too, we are sorry to say, not at all solitary — 

 a result, however, which has been brought about entirely by 

 mismanagement and erroneous ideas. Given good healthy 

 trees to commence with, then the cultivator's primary duty is 

 to secure a healthy uniformity of growth throughout the entire 

 tree. This is best effected in summer by pinching and repress- 

 ing the stronger-growing portions and encouraging the weaker. 

 If, after all, in the succeeding winter some branches be much 

 stronger than others, the pruning policy should be reversed, 

 the strong shoots laid in at full length, and the weaker cut 

 more closely back— all in proportion to their strength. In the 

 following summer the object should be to try and secure as 

 much leaf action on the weaker as on the stronger branches, as 

 before. If, notwithstanding all attempts at repression, the 

 plants still grow too vigorously and continue unfruitful, it is 



