204 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ Mavoli 12, 1868. 



like the Variegated Alyssum. Its duration of flowering is from 

 May to December without fail, and gathering in profusion of 

 bloom and colour to the last. 



Its management is extremely easy, but it must not he left to 

 itself, as herbaceous plants are generally. It is best raised from 

 cuttings every year, the old plants being thrown away ; and 

 ■with half the kind treatment given to Purple King Verbena, it 

 will flower longer, and will rival or excel it in show throughout 

 the season. I put in a batch of cuttings in fine soil in the open 

 border about September, in close nursery lines, and every 

 cutting strikes before winter. In March ive transplant the 

 young plants to where they are to remain ; or if that is not 

 practicable until bedding time, we give them more room in the 

 border, when they make nice plants by the middle of May. 



We use it in lines or masses on the panel system. Edged 

 with a broad baud of Cerastium it is beautiful ; mixed with 

 Scarlet Pelargoniums or any strong Verbena ; or with Mangles' 

 Pelargonium, Alyssum, or Saponaria, it is also fine. The 

 Nepeta can be used with fine efl'ect in combinations where 

 Verbena venosa is used, and will be successful on soils where 

 the Verbena is useless — that is, cold and heavy soils. This 

 plant is common enough in most gardens where old herbaceous 

 plants are not entirely banished. — {The Gardener.) 



GALVANISED WIRE TRELLISES FOR GARDEN 

 WALLS. 



I A3I about to state how we have endeavoured to avoid driving 

 nails into walls. In those of this garden, whoever bnilt them, 

 very inferior mortar was used ; and, besides, the wall is hollow, 

 being built brick-on-edge, having, say, at every 12 feet or so, 

 a solid piece by way of a tie. This might have answered the 

 purpose bad the mortar employed been made of good materials 

 and been used when in a proper state. The question, there- 

 fore, was, how best to preserve the walls for use without going 

 to the expense of pulling them all down and rebuilding them. 

 In the long-run this might have proved the best mode of 

 surmounting the difficulty. 



.\s driving nails into the walls displaced the bricks we thought 

 of using galvanised wire netting ; but here a difficulty arose, 

 for such rotten walls would not hold any large nail if driven 

 in between the bricks set on edge, and nails in the solid pieces 

 of the wall would not afford sufficient support for the wire 

 netting. After consultation it was determined that slight 

 battens should be fastened to the walls, each having two slight 

 rods of iron passing through it. Where we have trees upon 

 both sides of the walls, the battens are fastened to the walls on 

 opposite sides by the same bolts ; and where there are no trees 

 trained against the outside of the wail, at each bolt is screwed 

 to the wall a piece of iron long enough to pass over more 

 than two courses of bricks. Of course, before the netting was 

 fastened to the battens the wall was repaired, and washed over 

 with proper lime, the glaring whiteness being softened down. 



The battens are about Ik inch thick, and 2} inches wide, and 

 are placed at about every 5 feet distance along the whole length. 

 Over the top of these npright battens another, much the same 

 in strength and appearance, is nailed down. The upper side 

 of the wire is fastened to this ; but the bottom of the wall 

 being firm enough to hold large nails, one or two of these 

 driven into the walls between the upright battens hold the 

 wire quite firmly. According to the height of the wall, and 

 how the different widths of netting suit, a spnco of from 3 to 

 5 inches is allowed between the pieces of nelting. These in 

 the 5-feet distance between the npright battens have three 

 or four ties of galvanised wire, thus making all secure. 



This method of attaching netting to the wall entirely ob- 

 viates the necessity of nailing, and the danger of displacing 

 even a single brick. The battens, as seen against the walls, 

 may to some persons appear objectionable ; but after a time 

 the eye becomes accustomed to them, especially when it is re- 

 membered there is' a good reason for their being there. In all 

 solid-built walls there is no necessity for battens being used. 



Since the galvanised wire netting has been put up I have 

 visited several large old gardens, where the walls show that 

 many thousands of nails have been driven into them in the 

 course of years. Would not such walls stand as long again if 

 they were fresh pointed, galvanised nails driven in, and gal- 

 vanised wire netting fastened to them with wire likewise gal- 

 vanised ? In this way the netting is scarcely perceptible at 

 20 or 30 yards distance. 



The size of the mesh of the netting may depend on taste 



and the kind of trees ; Peach and Nectarine trees will, of course, 

 require a smaller mesh than Pear and Plum trees ; hut there 

 is no necessity to use a less mesh, even for Peach trees, than 

 2i or 3 inches. Had I my choice I would certainly use gal- 

 vanised wire netting rather than deface and otherwise injure 

 £0od walls, and when iron spikes or strong nails are made use 

 of as fastenings to the walls, there cannot bo any objection to 

 its use as regards appearance. I shall be glad to learn how 

 others may have used it. — G. Dawson. 



I HAVE had nine years' experience with a galvanised wire 

 trellis, and I must say during the whole of that time I have 

 never found the slightest objection to it. On the contrary, 

 there are these advantages : training can be done quite as 

 quickly, if not more so, than by nailing ; there is a more free 

 circulation of air about the wood, consequently it becomes more 

 firm and ripe ; and there is not that disappointment which I 

 have experienced on going to gather a dish of fruit, to all ap- 

 pearance very beautiful, and finding concealed behind nearly 

 all those which touch the wall, half a dozen or so of woodlice, 

 which have completely spoiled the fruit for the table. This is 

 invariably the case on our other wall, where the trees are nailed. 



I quite agree with " Agrestis," that the fruit does ripen 

 much more regularly on the trellis than where the trees are 

 nailed to the wall. 



Again, there is no nailing and nnnailing, which make the 

 wall full of holes, a harbour for insects, and ultimately the wall 

 must be repointed, no small inconvenience when it is covered 

 with trees. 



Respecting the complaint which " Ru.stic " makes about 

 the shoots dying, that I have never seen, unless they have been 

 tied too tightly, in which case they sometimes die. Any metal 

 pressing tightly against the wood will injure it, causing gum or 

 canker. 



We have also a common iron trellis painted black, which 

 answers very well, but the galvanised wire is the best ; it needs 

 no painting. — A. B. C. 



[The experience at the Chiswick Garden is in favour of wire 

 trellises, as was stated by the Eev. Mr. Berkeley at the last 

 meeting of the Royal Horticultural Society, see page 186.] 



CATERPILLARS ON BEDDING PLANTS. 



Allow me to inform your correspondent, Mr. F. Fowler, 

 that the lai-va of the Cabbage Moth (Mamestra Brassica;), al- 

 ways feeds up, forms an earthen cocoon, and turns to a pupa 

 in the autumn. It never hybernates. It is possible that his 

 larvae may have been those of Mania typica, which does pass 

 the winter in its larva state, and was rather troublesome in my 

 greenhouse during the early part of this winter ; but it is far 

 more probable that the caterpillars he found so destructive 

 were those of Phlogophora meticulosa, the Angle Shades Moth. 

 This larva is almost as often dark reddish brown as bright 

 green, and to an uninitiated entomologist, the two varieties 

 would seem to be different species. — H. HAKroii Ciiewe, 

 liectory, Drayton-Beaucham-p, Tring. 



NEW BOOKS. 



Ilandij Booh of the Flower Garden. By David Thomsox, 

 Archerfield Gardens. Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh and 

 London. 



TnEr.E are some men who never write upon any subject 

 unless they perceive that relative information is needed, and 

 that they "possess such information. Mr. Thomson is one of 

 those men, and the consequence is, that the book before us is 

 thoroughly good. In separate chapters, plants for spring, 

 summer, and autumn decoration are enumerated, and their 

 culture detailed ; ornamental-foliaged plants, herbaceous plants, 

 Hoses, Annuals, tc, receive a similar consideration, and the 

 whole concludes with chapters on the arrangement of colours, 

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 The Trees of Old England: Sketches of their A.^jtects, Associa- 

 tions, and Uses. By Leo H. Geindon, Lecturer on Botany at 

 the Royal School of Medicine, Manchester, &c. London: 

 F. Pitman. 



This is one of those books which every one peruses with 

 pleasure. It has for its themes the good, the true, the beauti- 



