280 PINE CULTURE IN SOUTH WALES. 



excellence. The Pines are grown both in pots and planted out, 

 some in loam and some in peat ; but the loam is of a fine and 

 unctuous character, soft as silk, and superior I think to the finest 

 of what about London is known as " Epping or Wanstead 

 Loam." The peat is of the soft kind, rich and spongy, and 

 further enriched, I suspect, by proper and timely preparation 

 before it is used for the Pines. 



The structures used for the growth of the Pine consist of two 

 pits, one 68 feet by 12 feet in the clear in which the plants are 

 grown principally in pots, and the other 33 feet by 13 feet in 

 which the plants are planted out in the open border. Succession 

 plants are also grown so in tan-beds in the Vineries, but these 

 are by no means good places for them. The pits and houses 

 also are heated by steam pipes, and the smaller pit again has 

 steam pipes passing through the bed for bottom-heat ; the pits 

 have moreover the advantage of strong dung linings, which I con- 

 sider the sheet-anchor of Mr. Jones's success, for when the pits 

 are opened the rush of the ammonia-impregnated moisture is 

 almost overpowering. These pits are of the old-fashioned con- 

 struction, with very flat roofs and common glass ; in fact, there 

 is nothing about these structures to induce the belief that any 

 superiority can arise from them. 



In the small pit the plants were planted out in peat, and 

 surfaced with loam, and they stood about two feet apart. I have 

 seen much larger plants than these were, but I never saw any 

 in which health and vigour were so incontestably present. They 

 are intended to be in cut in June and July, and at that time will 

 be a sight worth seeing. 



Next in point of merit to Dowlais may be mentioned Singleton 

 (J. H. Vivian, Esq.), and here both the garden and Pine arrange- 

 ments are quite new. This garden is in a very sheltered 

 situation, and but a short distance from the sea, so that the 

 atmosphere is milder than in more inland situations. Two 

 houses are used, one for the cultivation of succession plants, 

 and the other a pit in which they are fruited. In the former 

 house the plants are in pots, but all the fruiting plants are 

 planted out in a bed through which pipes pass for bottom- 

 heat. The depth of compost, consisting mainly of peat inter- 

 mixed with loam and charred rubbish, is about fourteen 

 inches ; and it is singular, Mr. Barron informs me, to see how 

 the roots of the plants wrap themselves round and round the 

 hot-water pipes. No provision has been made for nourishing the 



