n40 



JOUUNAL OF HOBTIOULTUEE AND COTTAGE GAEDENER. 



[ Jannary 16, 1868. 



Bent out in 1867; Princess Mary of CambriJge, white, blotched 

 ■with carmine ; Sir W. Hooker, cerise, blotched with carmine. 



Of the older flowers, without taking any notice of the year in 

 ' which they were sent out, I consider the following as the best : 



White or Lif]ht Varieties. — Queen Victoria, Eurydice, Eleanor 

 Norman, Shakespeare, and Milton, creamy white and flaked. 



Red and Scarlet. — Meyerbeer, Marechal Vaillant, Fulton, 

 Ensign, The Colonel, Comte de Morny, and Napoleon III. 



Cerise. — Bernard Palissy, Le Poussin, John Waterer, and 

 Due de Malakoff. 



Lilac. — Anais, Bella Gabrielle, Empress Engfinie, and Ma- 

 dame Furtado. 



Yelloic. — El Dorado. 



Ease. — Noemie, Princess Clothilde, Penelope, Charles 

 Dickens, and Madame Vilmorin. 



The few I have grown of Mr. Standish's varieties, such as 

 Eleanor Norman, The Colonel, and Ensign, I consider better 

 shaped than the very best of the foreigners. — William Tilleet. 



THE EOYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY'S 

 SPRING AND SUMMER SCHEDULES FOR lso8. 



These are now before the public, and, taken as a whole, are 

 ari'anged in a very liberal spirit and on an extensive scale. In 

 looking through them, however, there are a few things that 

 strike one as being open to improvement. 



First, greater inducements are offered to the trade than 

 there are to amateurs and gentlemen's gardeners. Both of the 

 latter have to compete at a great disadvantage with the trade 

 for this reason — neither the amateur nor the gardener has the 

 stock to select from that the nurseryman has, nor have they 

 conveniences to produce plants or flowers, at an early period of 

 the season especially, such as the nurseryman has. In either 

 case, the amateur or gardener must have his houses filled to 

 overflowing with subjects suitable for his family or his employer's 

 purposes. There are very few places in the country where the 

 gardener will find houses for the express purpose of growing 

 plants, &o., for exhibition only — a thousand things are gene- 

 rally required from the gardener, whether he has few or many 

 glass structures for horticultural purposes. 



In glancing over the schedule of the show of Hyacinths and 

 Early Spring Flowers, to be held on the Uth of March, the 

 highest prize is offered to nurserymen only, and Class 2 being 

 open, the highest in it is almost sure to go to the trade. The great 

 point in their favour is that as soon as their stock of bulbs 

 arrive in the autumn, they can at once select the very strongest 

 and most suitable for their purpose, whilst the amateur or 

 gardener must do the best he can with what he has sent him. 

 The wording of the schedule, in my opinion, should therefore 

 be reversed, allowing the gardener or amateur to compete on 

 more equal terms with the nurseryman. This could be done 

 by making a division for amateurs in Classes 1 and 2, which 

 should read thus : " Class 1 : 18 Hyacinths distinct, nursery- 

 men, £2, £1, 15s. Class 1, amateurs : 18 Hyacinths, distinct, 

 £3, £2, £1 ;" and Class 2, instead of being" open, should be 

 arranged in a similar way. This would give the amateur a 

 fair chance, and the consequence would be that the number of 

 exhibitors would be very much increased, thereby making the 

 Society's exhibition much more attractive to the public, and 

 consequently bringing together a much larger number of visitors. 



A similar drawback again occurs in the schedule for the Show 

 of Eoses and Early Spring Flowers, to be held on the 18th of 

 April. Nine classes out of thirteen are open, thus giving the 

 trade nine chances to the amateur's four. Something similar 

 occurs in most of the succeeding schedules. 



At the Grand Summer Flower Show, to be held on the 2nd 

 of June and three following days, in Class 1 there should 

 be provision made for the amateur as well as the nursery. 

 man, by giving another set of prizes of equal amount, thus 

 confining the competition to nurserymen in one half of the 

 class, and to amateurs in another. There are few amateurs 

 who could compete, with any hope of success, with the fine 

 collections of Messrs. Yeitch, "Turner, Eraser, Glendinning, and 

 others. The consequence is that many fine collections are 

 kept at home, and the exhibition loses much in effect and extent, 

 visitors telling their friends who may have made up their 

 minds to see the exhibition on the following day that it is 

 scarcely worth their going to see, as the competition is con- 

 fined to five or six exhibitors, and that on this occasion there 

 are only the same plants they have frequently seen before 

 exhibited again. Offer the amateur and gardener the same 



advantages, and we shall see five times the number of plants 

 exhibited, and a much greater amount and variety of talent 

 and skill displayed by exhibitors. Fresh ideas will be intro- 

 duced at each exhibition, and instead of seeing large one-sided 

 masses of colour, we shall see plants that will be a credit both 

 to the managers of our exhibitions and to cultivators as well. 



The schedule for the great Rose Show, to be held on the 

 30th of June, is much more equally balanced, and shows at a 

 glance that much more care and thought have been used in 

 compiling it. At this show the amateur competes on equal 

 terms with the nurseryman ; and if this can be arranged for 

 the lovers of the Kose, why is it not done for the lovers of 

 plants generally ? There are fully as many gardeners and 

 amateurs who are quite as enthusiastic in the cultivation of 

 other flowers. I need not here prolong my criticism, as, no 

 doubt, this letter will be the means of drawing out the opinions 

 of others who are more interested in the matter than I am. 



I would remind the Council of the Eoyal Horticultural So- 

 ciety that greater punctuahty is necessary in the distribution 

 of their medals, &e., after they have been awarded to exhi- 

 bitors. If these have to wait six, nine, twelve months, or 

 two years before they receive their medals, much of the in- 

 terest they would otherwise feel is lost, and the employer is 

 apt to say, " It is of no use your exhibiting at the Eoyal Horti- 

 cultural Society, for you will have to wait a year or two before 

 you receive your prize." — F.E.H.S. 



C0NIFERJ3 AT MR. MITCHELL'S, PILTDOWN. 



In the latter part of the summer of 1866 I paid a visit to 

 Mr. Mitchell's nurseries at Piltdown, in Sussex, a notice of 

 which appeared in the Journal of September 18th of that year. 

 The duration of the visit being limited to a few hours, the 

 notes were necessarily restricted to a general review of the 

 nurseiy stock, among which some fine specimens of Conifers 

 were especially mentioned ; but there are also many others of the 

 same and different species that were then passed over. Among 

 them are some of the largest and most perfect forms of particu- 

 lar kinds of these beautiful and stately trees that can be seen. 



Nor was it by the particular specimens only that my atten- 

 tion was strongly interested, for the stock of the different 

 kinds, in some instances to be counted by hundreds, was 

 similarly remarkable for healthy growth, colour of foliage, and 

 every essential requisite for forming fine specimens. I was, 

 therefore, very desirous of ascertaining as far as possible under 

 what conditions these invaluable subjects for the adornment of 

 our gardens and grounds could thrive so uniformly well. If 

 the Editors and readers will accept this as a sufficient reason 

 for again bringing these nurseries before their notice, they 

 will also judge how gladly I accepted an invitation from Mr. 

 Mitchell to again visit Piltdown, and make such further in- 

 spection and observations as my time permitted. 



Doubtless, the soil and situation of Piltdown are the para- 

 mount influences in producing the free and perfect growth of 

 every kind of Conifer in cultivation there ; but to these must 

 also be added the vigilant care with which they are watched 

 over by the proprietor, .aided in no small degree by the intelli- 

 gence and superintendence of his son. Conifers of some kind 

 will grow almost everywhere. In situations less favoured than 

 Piltdown, if they do not thrive quite so satisfactorily, much 

 may be done by cultivation. 



It is a mistake to suppose that having selected and planted 

 out cue or more of the many beautiful kinds now so easily to 

 be obtained, there is an end to all further care about it, except 

 to those easy-going people who are indiSerent whether their 

 plants become specimens worth regarding hereafter or not. 

 Our (the gardening) world is not so quietly ordered that we 

 can treat any class of subjects as an exhibition of waxwork, the 

 only difference being that the vegetable figures are expected to 

 grow larger. Such at least is not my limited experience as 

 regards Conifers, especially when the plants are young, al- 

 though admitting the great fact that the many thousands 

 planted out annually for ornamental purposes only, receive 

 little or no attention after planting, and that very many of 

 them do well. It does not follow, however, that many might 

 not do better, even if it is prudent sometimes to " let well 

 alone." They, therefore, in common with every class of plants 

 taken under man's care, require a certain amount of culti- 

 vation according to their habit and age ; it is a requisite to all 

 improvement, and even to the maintenance of the natural 

 condition of kinds brought from distant lands. 



