160 



JOUKNAL OF HOETICULTUBE AND COTTAGE GABDESES. 



[ August 20, 1874. 



invariably barren, and the other half fruitful. By attention to 

 this one point — restricting the kinds which do naturally well 

 in a certain district, grafting the unprofitable ones with sorts 

 that are profitable, the fruit-resourees of the country would 

 be materially increased in a very few years. 



Were I called on to plant extensively to produce a useful 

 supply of fruit, I should limit myself to a very few sorts which 

 I had reason to believe would prosper in the looahty. Were I, 

 on the other hand, to find already planted great variety produc- 

 ing little fruit, my one object would be to keep cutting-down the 

 worst — those that would not do — and grafting with the best- 

 that is, with those proving themselves good and certain bearers. 

 By that plan in time, and no long time either, there would be 

 plenty of fruit. That is the practice that will have to be 

 adopted by those who have planted on the one-tree-of-a-sort 

 system before they get any satisfactory bulk of fruit. Grow- 

 ing trees one of a sort on the pigmy system — that is, carrying 

 root-pruning and summer-pinching to extremes with trees in 

 an early state, will result in a garden museum of pomologieal 

 curiosities, but never in a full and useful harvest of fruit. 

 This infantile mutilation of fruit trees is going out of fashion, 

 simply because the majority of growers can see no good in it. 

 There may be fanciful amateurs who enjoy an orchard of lili- 

 putiau trees, and they have a right to indulge in the mode of 

 culture that best pleases them ; but for a huge bulk of useful 

 produce let the trees have liberty to build-up a stout, sound 

 framework, permit them to attain a healthy development, and 

 then, if the sorts be good in themselves and suitable to the 

 district, a golden yield may be expected. I like both root- 

 pruning and summer-pinching, but not with severity when the 

 trees are young and small, converting them into stubborn 

 stunted dwarfs to die prematurely by lack of vital force. 



But another idea may have utterance respecting Mr. Pew- 

 tress's trees and their liability to injury by frost in spring. 

 It is this — that fruit blossom often suffers more on trees in a 

 young state than on older ones. Has not everybody observed 

 an old standard tree laden with fruit, when young dwarfs 

 around it are fruitless ? This very year our orchard of young 

 trees has produced nothing, while some old ones towering 

 ing high in the air are carrying a useful crop. They were all 

 alike covered with blossom, but that of the young ones is taken, 

 and that of Ihe old ones left. Frost was the fell destroyer. 

 But why ? The position is a low one. Was it not that the 

 upper strata of air was drier than the lower one at the moment 

 of the frost's visitation ? I am of opinion that that is the 

 solution of the difference, and I am fortified by the fact that 

 another orchard in the same parish, but high and diy and ex- 

 posed, is UteraUy laden with fruit, although the frost was fully 

 as severe as on the spot where every blossom was killed. If I 

 take my stand in this place for instance, and with an imaginary 

 pair of compasses set to a mile radius draw a circle, and 

 within this estimate the fruit on low-growing young trees, not 

 only bush and pyramid, but young half-grown orchards on the 

 one hand, and old tall standard trees on the other, what do I 

 find? Where I find 10 cwt. on the low ones in the damp 

 strata of au-, I find 10 tons on the tall ones, where the air was 

 drier at the time of blossoming. This is very startling, but 

 very true. It is not always so, the younger and dwarfer trees 

 sometimes bearing prodigiously, as, indeed, this spring they 

 were in a sheet of blossom. 



There is much yet to be learned on the relative hardiness 

 of the blossoms of fruits, and if those having large collections 

 would steadily observe this point, something valuable might be 

 educed. No wish is entertained to discourage the planting 

 of dwarf trees ; on the contrary, varieties suited to localities, 

 and these planted by the dozen or hundred, according to size 

 of garden, instead of having every tree a separate variety, 

 would give abundance of fruit in a few years. My experience 

 leads me to this, that in districts subject to spring frost let 

 the trees have liberty and get up in the air. Better have to 

 get ladders to gather than have no fruit to pick. That, too, 

 is the best means of retarding and hardening blossom by its 

 exposure to the full sweep of a cooler rarer atmosphere than 

 exists a few feet from the ground. I remember on a certain 

 June 2nd having five thousand Geraniums killed in the beds, 

 a number in tall vases above them escaping with injuries, but 

 easily recovered. This may be cold comfort to Mr. J. W. Pew- 

 tress, who seems to have gone in for miniature trees. His 

 plan, if his sorts are numerous, is, I venture to suggest, to 

 watch and graft, and he may yet get fruit. There are other 

 three lines in his letter that most people wiU admire : — " I 

 daresay another gardenet would succeed better, but my man 



suits me in so many ways I must keep him, even if I lose my 

 fruit by it." Mr. Pewtress need not have told us he was an 

 " old man." He has evidently world-experience. No man is 

 perfect in everything, and if his gardener suits in " many 

 ways" he is not far below average. There is much discomfort 

 engendered by both masters and men expecting too much. If 

 a man suits in " many ways," keep him ; if a master in most, 

 stay with him and serve him well, and there will be more 

 comfort, confidence, and content in the world than at present 

 exists. Mr. Pewtress may rely on it that it is not his man that 

 is the cause of his having no fruit under the circumstances 

 he describes, but a younger man might have thought so, and 

 have changed a servant suiting in many ways for another that 

 suited hardly in any ; but to get a man to fill a garden with 

 fruit on unsuitable varieties on an unsuitable site cannot be 

 expected without expecting too much. We ought to have a 

 supreme pity for unfortunate gardeners who are expected ta 

 " make bricks without straw," and a supreme honour for those 

 employers who can and do think calmly and decide justly, not 

 only as to the capacities of the man, but as to the nature of 

 the material he has to work with, and the circumstances sur- 

 rounding and governing the work. — J. Wright. 



DISBUDDING KOSES. 



I STATED in my account of the Frome Rose Show that Mr. 

 Keynes, of Salisbury, introduced the art or practice of dis- 

 budding Roses. My reasons for stating this were that Mr. 

 Keynes has often told me so ; and secondly, my friend Mr. 

 Reynolds Hole makes the same statement in his "Book upon 

 Roses," page 291, fourth edition. Since my letter appeared 

 Mr. Cant, of Colchester, has written to me to connect the 

 statement; and as I think it is not only just that we should 

 give " honour to whom honour is due," and also important 

 that rosarians should know who first introduced this practice, 

 I wiU ask your leave to quote that portion of his letter which 

 refers to the question. 



" With respect to your letter in Journal of Hokticultdbe, 

 somehow you have been misled in stating that Mr. Keynes 

 was the first to introduce the practice of disbudding. I used 

 to do it before Mr. Keynes appeared in the field as one of the 

 great Rose-growers, and well call to mind the fuss that was 

 made about it as far back as 1859 at the National Rose Show. 

 (I think it was at the Hanover Square Rooms). Some of the 

 exhibitors thought it unfair, and others even went so far as to 

 say I ought to be disqualified. I admit that I did not carry 

 out the disbudding to the extent it is done now, simply be- 

 cause I was afraid to do it. More notice was probably taken 

 of it when Mr. Keynes came out, because he did it withont 

 flinching." 



This letter wOl, I think, settle the question, as, if it was at 

 the Hanover Square Rooms, and in 1859, that disbudded 

 Roses were first exhibited, that would be at the second National 

 Rose Show, at which I believe Mr. Keynes did not exhibit. — 

 — JoHS B. M. Camm, Monkton U^ijld. 



THE POTATO CROP. 



Fro5i personal observation near the seacoast of Wales, and 

 in some of the midland counties, we can testify that as late as 

 last week the Potato plants in field and garden were vigorous 

 and undiseased. We emphasise "vigorous," because we con- 

 sider that varieties so late in ripening should not be cultivated. 

 The season of danger commences about the end of July, and 

 we believe that if every Potato were out of the ground between 

 that date and the 10th of August the Potato disease would be 

 altogether avoided. 



We met recently large cultivators of the Potato, and they 

 all said that they in future should cultivate no variety that is 

 not early or middling early. 



Well done, " H. G. M." ! (see page 148). You are well to the 

 front, but you are none too soon, for the rains are upon us, 

 second growth is making rapid progress, and the blight looms 

 behind darker than the thunder cloud which foretells its 

 advent. I began lifting the general crop three days earlier 

 this season, and have tried hard to finish to-day, August 13th, 

 but the drenching rain drove us from the field, and last night 

 most of us were wet to the skin; but the bulk of the crop is 

 in a nice airy storehouse, and a few hours' more fine weather 

 will bring the Potato culture of 1871 to a successful issue. 

 My mainstay, Paterson's Victoria, is an excellent crop, the 



