274 NOTICE OF A VISIT TO PITM ASTON. 



of about 23°. Nine plants, raised singly in pots, were planted 

 out on this slope, and, till somewhat established, they require to 

 be protected by hand-glasses ; flat tiles are then laid over the 

 surface. The shoots or vines of the melons are neither stopped 

 nor thinned ; in short, with the exception of merely pegging them 

 down, there is nothing at all done to them. Instead of tiles being 

 employed, as above, slates were formerly used ; but these became 

 at times so excessively heated by the sun's rays, that the plants 

 suffered from being subjected to the consequent vicissitude of so 

 great a heat in the day alternately with the cold to which they 

 were exposed at night. Tiles, on the contrary, do not absorb 

 heat so rapidly, but they retain it longer. 



The situation of the melon-bed is not particularly sheltered ; 

 there is a hedge on the north side at the distance of 1 5 feet from 

 the back of the melon-bed, but it is not high. Two feet behind 

 the hedge there is, however, some tall elm-trees, and at some 

 distance there is a row of the same kind of trees which afford 

 shelter from the west winds. The mode in which the plants are 

 reared is an important point: they are raised witli as little heat 

 as possible, and are all along accustomed to plenty of air. Mr. 

 Williams remarks that, " when melon-plants are raised for the 

 purpose of being planted on a bed of the above description in 

 the open air, the pots in which the seeds are sown should never 

 be plunged in a warm dung or tan-bed, or the roots exposed to 

 what gardeners call bottom-heat ; as 1 find by experience, that 

 when plants so treated are removed into the common ground, if 

 the weather proves cold and wet their leaves turn yellow, and 

 they afterwards become sickly, and continue so a long time." 

 Horticultural Transactions, First Series, vol. v. p. 351. 



A glazed pit, also for the growth of melons, has the back and 

 ends of brick, but the front rests on supports of 2-inch cast-iron 

 pipes, leaving an opening of 9 inches between the lower end of 

 the sashes and the ground, or rather a slate paving, which 

 extends outwards in front to the distance of 2^ feet. The space 

 between the ends of the sashes and the outside of the slate- 

 paving is covered over with wire gauze, wliich not only breaks 

 effectually any strong current of air, but imparts warmth to it 

 when the wire is heated by radiation from the slates. This is 

 described in ' Horticultural Transactions,' Second Series, vol. ii. 

 p. 161 ; and the diagram at p. 163 will give a sufficient idea of 

 the pit, a brick-work back and ends having since been substituted 

 for tiie former supports, the other arrangements remaining the 

 same. 



At a corner of the lawn, west from the rockwork, a larch, 

 which was topped when 12 or 13 feet higli, upwards of thirty 

 years ago, forms a very picturesque object ; it is represented in 



