January 20, 1870. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



59 



Milky White, which it much resembles in its flesh. Mr. Dain- 

 tree has a new seedling resembling it in every respect, except- 

 ing that this new variety — Daintree's Biker's Dozen — cracks 

 its ekin a little more daring its progress towards matnrity. I 

 have written " Baker's Dozen," because, when Mr. Daintree, 

 Fendrayton, near St. Ives, Hunts, sent the sort for me to try, 

 two years ago, he said " he had a great opinion of it," and re- 

 quested me to give it a name. There were thirteen tnbers in 

 the package, so I have named his variety the Biker's Dozen. 



Harris's Imperial Kidney (Catbnsh St Son). — A capital prolific 

 market or household Potato, and suitable for garden or field 

 culture. It comes a little too pyriform in shape to please me, 

 although the sample that Mr. Cutbush presented to me was a 

 white blunt-nosed kidney of the handsomest type. There can 

 be no mistake about its capability of producing a very heavy 

 crop. 



Almond's Yorkshire Hero. — A prolific andexcellent late-keep- 

 ing Potato, suitable for either garden or field culture, and at 

 the top of the list for fHvour, and as being suitable for market, 

 household, or the parlour table ; albeit a little too dry in its 

 eating to please the extreme palates of a few. It is the best 

 strain of the Lapstons Kidney family, and it is of the hybrid 

 class raised by Mr. Thomas Almond, by the modern method 

 of grafting the eye of one Potato in the tuber of another. If 

 this variety cannot he obtained, substitute for it Haigh's original 

 Cobbler's Lapstone, which, I doubt, will be found even more 

 difficult to procure. The family are as prolific as rabbits, and 

 when chosen by natural selection, which has been much resorted 

 to, the younger branches are mostly of a quality sufficient to be 

 thought worthy of keeping : hence there are innumerable varie- 

 ties of it, but onlv one that I know excels the original, and it 

 is the Yorkshire Hero. 



Gryffe Castle Repent, the " King of the class Regents." — This 

 excellent variety was raised in Renfrewshire, and sent to me 

 by a "Brother Bee-keeper," amongst other famous north- 

 country Potatoes, in a bar-and-frame Stewarton hive. I never 

 knew him nor his name through these pages, but the world 

 has been told often enough how I have utilised the hive, 

 and all about the Potatoes, but I think the raiser of this ex- 

 cellent Potato has never advertised it up to its worth. I sect 

 it to the Rev. W. F. Radclyffe, and both with him and myself 

 it ranks highest in the Regent class. Walker's Second Early 

 Regent and the old York Regent are the other sorts-to be pre- 

 ferred in lieu of it. Field cultivation only. 



New American lied is also a Regent. It is a great cropper, 

 and a stain of rose-colour predominates in blotches throughout 

 its flesh when cooked ; but it may lose this feature by about 

 February ; and it is not fair, generally speaking, to cook the 

 Regent class for correct judgment till that period. This va- 

 riety is a great cropper, and suitable for field cultivation only. 

 It will quite supersede the American Rose in our English 

 climate and soil. 



Paterson's Victoria. — Although no favourite of mine, on 

 account of its tendency to subtuberate, it is yet a good field 

 Potato, and well suited for the market table or the servants' 

 hall. Like my Onwards, it will suit the north better than our 

 southern counties. — Roeeet Fenn. 



SHOULD WE TRY TO IMITATE THE NATIVE 

 CLIMATE OF AN EXOTIC? 



"G. S.," in a note upon hygrometers (see page 23), says that 

 in addition to these we also want information "as to the dry- 

 ness of the countries whose productions we grow." Without 

 presuming for one moment to differ from " G. S." as to the 

 desirability of every cultivator carrying that knowledge about 

 with him, I hope I may be allowed to question the propriety 

 of our attempting to copy exactly the climates of other countries 

 in the cultivation of exotic fruits and plants. One substantial 

 reason why we should not is our sheer inability to do so suc- 

 cessfully. If we suppose that the Vine, for instance, has one 

 particular combination of light, heat, and moisture which is 

 best for it, and that the proper quantity of this combination pre- 

 dominates in those countries of which it is a native, then our 

 policy manifestly is to produce a facsimile of these climates if 

 we can ; but if we fail to supply the due quantity of any one 

 of these agents — and we do and always must fail in the case of 

 light — then it is certainly not consistent to set the climate of 

 these countries before ns as models in regard to the other two 



question whether the natural climatic condition of any country 

 is always the best possible for its natural productions. In 

 other words, suppose that some one species is known to be 

 indigenous to only one country in the world, are we, therefore, 

 debarred from thinking that in other countries and under very 

 different circumstances it might attain an equal if not a more 

 perfect degree of development ? Taking Astrachan as one of 

 the native habitats of the Vine, and where Humboldt asserts, 

 as quoted by " G. S.," the finest Grapes in the world are pro- 

 duced, here is an epitome of its climate taken from one of 

 our standard works, " The climate of Astrachan is one of 

 extremes." " A dry and parching heat prevails in summer, 

 when the thermometer frequently stands at 100° even in the 

 shade, yet the nights are in general nipping, and the winds 

 deposit the saline particles with which the air is charged in 

 such profusion, that every object appears veiled in the morn- 

 ing with hoar frost. Autumn is of short duration ; the winter 

 colds, when the north wind blows, sink the quicksilver to 30° 

 below zero." " Humboldt, indeed, reports (in his ' Climatology 

 of Asia '), that finer Grapes do not exist even in Italy or the 

 Canaries than in Astrachan ; but these, as well as other fruit 

 and vegetables, however fine to the eye, are watery and insipid 

 to the palate. The wine which is produced here is of equally 

 indifferent quality." It is also a native of Syria, and in some 

 districts is extensively cultivated, yet recent travellers tell us 

 that in point of size the Grapes are greatly inferior to those 

 grown in this country, and that the Grapes of Damascus, 

 25 and 30 lbs. in weight, are myths. If transported to any of 

 these countries with all their appliances and means to boot, I 

 think it is very problematical if " G. S." or Mr. Meredith, of 

 Gareton, or Mr. Johnston, of Glamis, could grow Grapes one 

 whit better, if so well, as where they are. 



A most sensitive hygrometer was invented by Mr. Adie, of 

 Edinburgh, which I think would suit " G. S." It is com- 

 posed of a small bag made of the internal membrane of the 

 common Reed (Phragmites communis), and fitted like a bulb 

 to the lower end of a thermometer tube. It is then filled 

 with quicksilver, which rises and falls in the tube agreeably to 

 the rapid and very sensible changes that take place in the con- 

 traction and expansion of the membrane from the humidity or 

 dryness of the air. The sensibility of this membrane far 

 exceeds that of catgut. — Ayrshire Gardener. 



But apart from that altogether, I think it is at least an open 



THE ANTIRRHINUM AS A DECORATIVE 

 PLANT. 



In these days, when tho almost-universal cry is for novelty, 

 many old-fashioned plants — not the less valuable because old- 

 fashioned — are pushed aside in a spirit of forgetfulness of the 

 good service done in times past, to make way for new and un- 

 tried plants, the nature of whose service in the flower garden 

 is at least involved in doubt. One of these old-fashioned 

 plants is the Antirrhinum, of which it is not too much to say 

 that it is one of the most useful summer-blooming plants far 

 the mixed border. I was forcibly reminded of the beauty of 

 the Antirrhinum as a border plant when visiting the gardens 

 of tho Archiepiscopal Palace at Armagh, Ireland, dining the 

 past summer. Mr. Welch, the gardener, had large patches of 

 it to cut from, as well as fine bushes growing singly in the 

 I borders, and to state that they were masses of bloom is only 

 barely describing their appearance. Scarcely anywhere else in 

 Ireland did such a sight meet my eyes ; and how seldom is 

 such a pleasant floricultural vision witnessed in England ! The 

 striped flowers among Mr. Welch's collection were particularly 

 striking, and while they were much more varied in character 

 than one could well have supposed, in nearly every instance 

 the novelly of character was allied to those dearly-cbeiished 

 desiderata of the florist — size, substance, and form. Mr. 

 Welch said they represented a strain he had obtained from 

 Scotland a few years since, and in his hands the strain had 

 not gone backwards. Notwithstanding, then, the reli 

 the Antirrhinum to comparative obscurity by the professional 

 florist, it is yet being looked after in certain nooks and corners, 

 and when it emerges again from its obscurity, and challenges 

 public attention, as it most assuredly will in the not distant 

 future, it will be clothed in such rharms] that it will attract 

 our 1 jve, and command our admiration. 



And now, taking a long ni^ht. westward, I come to'another 

 plaee where the Antirrhinum finds a generous home during the 

 period of exile. From East Stonehouee, near Plymouth, I 

 received in 1868, and again in September laBt, a box of charm- 



