March 4, 1869. ] 



JOURNAL OF IIOllTIOULTORE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



16^.. 



considers it Imlf ripe. The Pears are better flavonreil wlien 

 gathered thus enrly, nnd their season may be prolonged for at 

 least Bii weeks by nitburiug them in anccessiou. 



Jersey Uratioli is an excellent Pear ; Mr. Dancer has thirty 

 or forty large treeH. Lust season they were enorraonsly laden. 

 the brftnohus bending to the very ground with their hfftvy load. 

 The fi«iit wan large, some weigbing 16 ozs., of good quality, 

 and covered with a tliiok grey ruseet all over. It ia in gontral 

 a good croppor, yet I never saw trees so heavily ladi'n as those 

 wore last season, and witU fruit ao large and line on old standard 

 trees. It is excellent for market. 



Of other sorts grown for market by Mr. Dancer I may 

 mention Beurn' Base, always a sure croiiper, and an excellent 

 sort. Marie Louise is in general good, but not always, the fruit 

 being sometimes very gritty and full of blemishes. It is of ex- 

 cellent quality, and when good no Pear commands a more ready 

 sale. Grown on a standard or open pyramid, the fruit is of 

 far higher quality than that from a wall. Louise Eouno of 

 Jersey is aUo a favourite market sort, and with Mr. Dancer 

 the fruits are frequently of enormous size, and really excellent. 

 Beurr6 de Cipiaumont is an old and favourite sort, a profuse 

 bearer, and profitable variety for cultivation ; the trees form 

 naturally nice pyramids, and do not attain a very large size. 

 Beurr6 Diel is also a good and profitable sort, and a strong 

 grower. Paradise d'Automne somewhat resembles Beurre 

 BoBC, but ia not nearly so good. Ne Plus Meuris is also a 

 capital winter sort, snceoeding well as a standard, bat the fruit 

 is very ugly. Beurro d'Aremberg is Mr. Dancer's favouiito 

 amongst all the Pears, and that which he retains for his private 

 use. It is seldom, however, to be found so rich tnd good as it 

 is with Mr. Dancer. It is generally too acid, yet here I have 

 tasted it rich and particularly pleasant, with an agreeable brisk 

 acidity, which is its great feature. It is not a Pear much cul- 

 tivated for market. Knight's Monarch and Seckle were once I 

 largely planted in Mr. Dancer's grounds, but are both quite j 

 worthless for market, all the fruit of the former falling off the I 

 trees before ripening, and that of the latter being too small. 



Apples are not cultivated so largely as either Plums or Pears, 

 yet there are some nobla fruit produced from large old standard 

 trees of such sorts as Blenheim Pippin ; Northern Greening, a 

 fine kitchen sort ; Golden Noble, a truly noble Apple in appear- 

 ance as well as in qualily, bringing a higb price in the market ; 

 Dumelow's Seedling, better known in Covent Garden as the 

 Wellington, much esteemed for its fine cooking qualities ; 

 Hawthornden, a fine early sort, the trees rather liable to 

 oaiiker, and never attaining a large size ; Keswick Codlin, 

 which is gathered very early, and sent to market in immense 

 quantities before the other sorts come in, and which is one of 

 the best Apples for cooking, and a most abundant bearer ; 

 Yellow Ingestrie a very beautiful and excellent early small 

 yellow doi'sert sort, which does exceedingly well with Mr. 

 Dancer; HoUandbury, a free-bearing, large, and handsome 

 Sort,but not of much merit; Beauty of Kent; Red Quarrendeu ; 

 Rymer or Duke of York, a fine late culinary variety ; King of 

 the Pippins, a very excellent market sort; Small's Admirable, 

 already noticed ; and Braddick's Nonpareil, a very excellent sort, 

 fine for dessert use in winter. There are, besides, many others 

 too numerous to mention, the fruit of which are all of fine 

 quality, large, clear, and handsome, and nearly all produced on 

 the large old standard trees, which receive no attention further 

 than keeping the shoots and branches thin, so that plenty of 

 air is admitted to all parts of the tree. It is this which makes 

 fine fruit, and the trees are always in vigorous health through 

 the manuring and digging of the ground about their roots. 

 Lastly, but not least, I must notice a fine lot of Cox's Orange 

 Pippin. When this Apple came first into repute, Mr. Dancer, 

 who is ever eager to introduce a good variety, and more than 

 usually fond of experimentalising, had some old trees cut 

 down and grafted with this sort. These have now formed 

 large heads, and were last season loaded with most splendid 

 fruit. The branches were bending to the ground with their 

 heavy load. The two-year-old shoots from 2 to 3 feet long, 

 which had been unpruned, were thickly clustered. I counted 

 {rom one to two djzeu on each, fine and handsome, high in 

 colour, and rich in flavour. What a splendid Apple this is, 

 and it is also a profitable one to cultivate. 



Of Red Currants, Mr. Dancer is a great cultivator, and much 

 attention is paid to them. Currants are but small fruit, and 

 rather looked down upon; there is no crop, however, more 

 profitable to the market gardener. The quantity of Currants 

 sold in Covent Garden during the season is enormous, and there 

 are but few cultivators who grow them to such a large size as 



Mr. Dancer, or in such quantities. What an amount of con- 

 fusion exists with regard to the nomenclature of these fruits ! ' 

 We have scores of names, yet very little distinctive features 

 amongst them whereby tliey may bo recognised; eome ate ■ 

 said to be larger than others, some sweeter, some later, some 

 earlier, some with short bunches, others with long ones ; and 

 there are all these ditlorent characters, yet in an ordinary field 

 of an acre or so, professedly all of one sort, all the foims may 

 be found. I have found them so in a field of two acres lately 

 taken possession of by Mr. Dancer, vvhilo in his older grounds 

 tlioy are nearly all alike, uniform in growth, and uniform in the 

 fruits. Out of all in the two acres already .".lluded to, Mr. 

 Dancer and myself could only discover two or three bushes (Jf 

 what may be termed Dancer's utook, which is by fur the finest ol 

 any I have seen. The plants are of rather dwarf and compact 

 growth, nevtr rambling much, the It-aves iu the mass having 

 something of a metallic hue, very distinct, and the fruit is 

 very large, produced very abundantly, and of a fine bright red. 

 Plants of this sort only one-half the size produce quite a» much 

 fruit as large plants of the others. The diflnunce between 

 the two lots of bushes is remarkable ; the one, with a few ex- 

 ceptions, growing very strong, with i!io shoots grots, and the 

 fruits small and scanty; the other of stub!. y growth, and al- ■ 

 ways enormously loaded ; yot they are all called Red Dutch, 

 and have been most likely all propagated from the sumo stock. 

 If I might conjecture, the one lot has been deteriorated through 

 selecting all the strongest cuttings for propagaliou, without 

 paying regard to any other quality; wbilot the other, which I 

 know is correct, appears to have been perpetuated by selecting 

 cuttings from marked plants — plants of good habit, and bear- 

 ing good fruit. Mr. Dancer hopes iu a few years thus to throw > 

 light on this subject, and I only hope he may, for it is an im-. 

 poitantoue 



Currants in market gardens receive very generous treatment,-; 

 being planted in good soil, and well manuied. They are gens- . 

 rally planted at a distance of about 6 feet from each other in 

 the rows. In pruning only four or five stems are allowed to 

 each bush, all side shoots being closely cut cfi during the 

 winter, and at the base of thete the fruits are borne so thickly 

 that they may be pulled off by the handful. This woik is 

 principally performed by women, scores of whom are employed 

 for weeks in gathering the Currant crop. 



Having now given a review of the principal subjects cul- 

 tivated in this establishment, I shall in my next paper treat of 

 the soil, pruning, &c., as compared with other districts, and 

 with other practices in regard to fruit culture. — Leo. 

 (To be continued.) 



APPLE KEEPING. 



My fruit room was built in 17G1 by a great man, for he waa ■ 

 my great grandfather, so it follows of coursethat he was in one 

 sense great. It is an arched cellar, 40 feet long, 12 feet wide, 

 and 75 feet high. It was originally a wine cellar, but for many 

 years it has been used as a fruit room. In the centre is a 

 broad pathway, and on each side are shelves, on which the 

 Apples and Pears are placed on the bare boards. It is venti- 

 lated by only one aperture, y feet by 2, in the wall at tbe north- 

 west end just under the crown of the arch. .This aperture, 

 which has an iron grating, has a shutter with which it is closed 

 iu very severe weather. This closing is, however, of rare oc- 

 currence, for the shutter has not been used to any extent either 

 this or the past winter. The peifcct dryness of the cellar is 

 owing to its having a range of packing sheds over it, so that 

 the soil resting on the arcli has liecome iu the course of years 

 a mass of earth dry as dust. The temperature ot tbe place is 

 most remarkable for its evenness, ranging fnm the miildle of 

 October till the middle of March from 45° to 47°, tbe foimer 

 being the rate from the middle of November till the end of 

 February, seldom varying half a degree. This low even tem- 

 perature, with a supply of fresh air without draughts, seems 

 very favourable to the preservation of Apples and Pears, for 

 early autumn Apples, such as the Hawthornden and several 

 others, keep plump and sound till Christmas and even later. 

 To the feeling my fruit room is agreealdy warm in severe 

 weather iu winter, and agreeably cjol in hit wtather in summer. 



I may add that my unique fi uit room was furmed by scarping 



part of a steep wide fosse dug out en i) e ciest of this hill 



(Bunks Hill), seemingly as a timpoiarj mean- of ('e fence when, 



iu the parliamentary times, some skiimiihing took place in 



' this district, the direct road to ISeivmaiket ; ior we have Man- 



