Slaicb 9. 1876. 1 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



101 



the manure fresh from the stables, or do they find it best 

 that it should first be half or wholly rotted-down ? Do they 

 find any difference aeeordinc as the application is in summer 

 or winter, in dry weather or in rainy ? Perhaps Mr. Pearson 

 would also favour us with his further experience on a practice 

 of which he is in some measure the originator. Kvery ob- 

 .servation, whether leading to success or failure, is of import- 

 ance and should be recorded, for it is only from a comparison 

 of results under different conditions that we can arrive at any 

 trustworthy principle for our gnidanoe.— J. B. K. 



CHRYSANTHEMUMS. 



I HAVE for many years given a good deal of attention to 

 these most beautiful autumn flowers. I had not the advantage 

 of seeing the Temple Chrysanthemums this autumn ; but while 

 I am aware that the large blooms produced there are on long 

 and rather leafless stems, I take leave to differ from " A 

 Country Gardener" in his opinion volunteered to the lady 

 to whom he introduced himself as to the impossibihty of ob- 

 taining large blooms on short stems, and also aa to the fact 

 that they cannot be made available for a small greenhouse. 

 It is diliioult I admit, but by no means impossible, and it 

 requires much more real Bkill and attention to produce ten or 

 twelve good blooms on a plant with the foliage down to the 

 pot and about 21 inches high, than it does to grow a plant as 

 long as a fishing-rod with one or two enormous flowers. But I 

 have seen such plants grown in a small greenhouse belonging 

 to a lady in whose employ I am, and I hope to see more of 

 them this autumn, in spite of a very regular demand for various 

 othf r items required by the cook. 



The secret of obtaining such plants as my employer likes is 

 rapid growth, careful attention to watering, a full and constant 

 exposure to the enn, with a liberal supply of manure water 

 until the time arrives for the piixnts to set their buds, when it 

 must bo withheld or they will go blind ; and above all the 

 cuttings should not be struck before the middle or end of 

 April, and stopped only once — when the lower laterals are 

 well developed. 



I put two or three plants in a 10-inch pot, and these properly 

 managed will give three or four good blooms each, nine to 

 twelve for each pot. I am by no means always satisfied with 

 the result, and admit the mop-handle plan is easier and more 

 certain ; but one is simply a hideous dry stick with a fine 

 bloom on the top, the other a beautiful plant both in bloom 

 and foliage. — Cottager. 



THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



YouB report of the meeting of the 24th February does not 

 quite give the sense of what I said, or at least meant to say. 

 It should have run thus :— That much had been said about a 

 house-to-house canvass to bring in new Fellows living in the 

 neighbourhood of the gardens, but in my opinion the true 

 policy of the Council was to canvass the country for new 

 horticultural Fellows, giving them only horticultural privileges, 

 and charging them only one-guinea subscriptions, and that 

 this proposal had been laid before tho Council, and was at full 

 length in the ilivnimj Post that morning (21th February). 



Now that I am writing may I add, a/jro/jiw of some remarks at 

 the end of the President's speech, page 177, that having since 

 IST-'j constantly urged the guinea-subscription plan being tried, 

 I have had time to realise its difficulties. These, I believe, 

 will be most easily met (as is usually the ease) by a simple 

 broad line of policy. I would have two classes of Fellows — 

 those who want general privileges and those who want only 

 horticultural privileges. The first should pay, ns at present, 

 £4 i.-i. and £2 2.s., the latter one guinea. If the Council feor 

 that the present prop might be shaken before the new one was 

 in its place they might make the guinea fellowships dependant 

 on a sufficient number of suitable applicants. I believe, on 

 the contrary, that some of them who came in on horticultural 

 privileges would change to general, and that the present 

 miserably meagre attendances to see the choice flowers ex- 

 hibited at the Wednesday meetings must discourage exhibitors, 

 and that more admirers would bring still better shows, and 

 that this would act and re-act. Judging by the articles in the 

 Saturday Review, Pall Mall Gazette, and Piiiic/i, public opinion 

 appears awakened to the fact that the present use of the South 

 Kensington garden is hardly a legitimate one. If the gardens 

 were the head quarters of a Society which really represented 

 national horticulture the title to the ground would be very 



different from the present one, or from one given by an in. 

 come of £10,000 a-year from residents at South Kensington, — 

 (!eorge F. Wilson. 



INFLUENCE OF LIGHT AND AIR ON LADY 

 DOWNE'S GRAPE. 



This Grape, notwithstanding its excellent reputation as 

 generally the best late-keeping Grape in existence, has, in 

 instances which have come under our notice, met with great 

 disfavour on account of its thick leathery skin and deficiency 

 in flavour. To a very great extent this character is generally 

 correct, until at least far on in spring, when it developes to 

 some extent a Muscat flavour. During the past winter we 

 had an opportunity of tasting this Grape, both in December 

 and February, grown under the influence of as much light and 

 air as it could possibly be subjected to in this country, in a 

 large very light span-roofed house, with a maximum of glas^ 

 and a minimum of woodwork, and both direct and diffused 

 light to an extent which is rarely met with ; and bo excellent 

 in flavour, and so thin and actually tender in skin, were these 

 Grapes, that, had we not known that they were Lady Downe's, 

 we never could have believed that it could be grown with these 

 points so much modified and improved. They were, in fact, 

 rich sweet ( {rapes with comparatively a thin skin devoid of 

 toughness. No other influence could be credited with the 

 transformation but the extreme light and airiness of the 

 structure in which they were grown. — {Tlic Gardener.) 



PORTRAITS OP PLANTS AND FLOWERS. 



Cypripedium Koezli. Xat. ord., Orchidaceae. Littn., Gyn- 

 andria Monandria. — Flowers yellowish green, purple-marked. 

 " Cypripedium Roezli is a native of Now Grenada, where it 

 was found by Roezl on the banks of the Dagua river, which, 

 according to Regel, occupies a valley between two ranges of 

 the Andes. I find, however, no such river on the map, but 

 a small town of Dagua on the western declivity of the Andes 

 near the Bay of Chooo. The specimen flowered at Messrs. 

 Veitch's establishment in January, 1874. It is said to flower 

 perennially and profusely, a statement inconsistent with the 

 habits of any plants in continuous health, but which, if taken 

 with the caution to be used in accepting the laudatory adver- 

 tisements of choice plants, may be regarded as evidence of its 

 being a very free flowerer." — (Bot. Mag., t. 6217.) 



Anthurium Saundeesii. Nat. ord., Aroidea}. Linn , Te- 

 trandria Monogynia. — " Anthurinm Saundersii was received 

 from the rich collection of W. W. Saunders, Esq., but with no 

 information as to its native country, under the name of 

 A. coriaceum, Lind.; but it widely differs from Endlicher's 

 plant of that name, and approaches more nearly to A. Ottoni- 

 anum, Kunth, also a native of Brazil, and to one called 

 A. jatrophsefolium in the Kew collection, a name I have not 

 found in any publication." — [Ibid., t. 6218.) 



Episcia eeythhopus. Nat. ord., Gesneracen?. Linn., Didy. 

 namia Gymnospermia. — Flowers pale rose. " Introduced from 

 New Grenada bv Messrs. Veitch, who sent the plant in flower 

 in March, 1874."— (i/<irf., (. U219.) 



Talinum Arnottii. Nat. ord, Fovtnl&cesp. Linn, Dode- 

 oandria Monogynia. — " This is one of a colleolion of plants of 

 a very remarkable habit, which was sent to Iv«w in 1807 by the 

 Hon. David Arnot, then Commissioner for the Griqua States, 

 and residing at Eskdale, Albania. For tho most part they 

 presented more or less cylindrical or spindle-shaped woody 

 stocks of almost stony hardness, which serve as reservoirs of 

 moisture and nourishing matter during the scorching droughts 

 of the dry stony district they inhabit. Of these some re- 

 mained for several years in the stove before tli(-y showed any 

 signs of life, and when they did so they proved to belong to 

 very different natural orders. The genus Tulinum is repre- 

 sented in South Africa by a widely diffused species, the old 

 T. caffrum (to which the present is perhaps, too, nearly allied), 

 which differs in the narrow leaves contracted at both ends, 

 and, judging from dried specimens, the much smaller flowers. 

 The only other Old World species is T. cuneifolium, Willd, a 

 native of tropical Africa and Arabia, which extends eastwarda 

 into western India." — {Ibid., t. 0220.) 



BovcHEA psEUDOfiERVAu. Nat. ord., Verbenaoese. Linn., 

 Didynamia Angiospermia. — Flowers purple. " An annual 

 herb, often becoming almost shrubby at the base, widely dis- 

 tributed throughout the warmer parts of the South American 

 continent, from Peru to the province of St. Paul in South 



