7G 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GAKDENER. 



[ July 21, 1875. 



stances can tell how to do without shading, it would be re- 

 garded as a triumph over unfavourable circumetanceB. Until 

 they can do this they ought to modify their condemnation of 

 shading material in the case of not only Pines, but Melons, 

 Cucumbers, &c. 



"Looking at the practice of hothouse-shading in genera), 

 it strikes us that there is not a little that calls for alteration 

 or reform. One learner does not shade his Pines under any 

 circnmstanccB, because another and more advanced looks at 

 shading from one point of view and condemns it, and so the 

 former has his Pines browned and stunted into the very 

 picture of misery, and he wonders what is the matter. The 

 latter founds his instructions primarily on the fact that the 

 Pine is a native of a far brighter climate than ours, and partly 

 from his own experience under more favourable circumstances, 

 and forgets that circumstances may very much alter cases. 

 Then, rushing to another extreme. Orchid houses and plant 

 stoves are shaded with some thick dark brown material laid 

 in close contact with the surface of the glass, that gives very 

 little air and far too much heat, and so suffocates the plants 

 till they become not healthy growths, but mere attenuations 

 of vegetable tissue, and yield a very small proportion of weakly 

 blooms. A very important step has been gained in a better 

 knowledge of the temperatures suitable for plants which come 

 from the higher altitudes of very hot countries ; but it strikes 

 US that we have fully as much yet to learn in reference to the 

 amount of light, and shade, and air, which many of our hot- 

 house plants will not only bear, but from which they will be 

 actually improved and invigorated. The general dissemina- 

 tion of data on this point is manifestly defective. At all events, 

 shading, as practised in many cases, must be regarded as an 

 evil carried to unnecessary excess ; and there can be no doubt 

 a more moderate application of the principle would result in 

 improved cultivation. A thick dark-coloured shade is rolled 

 on in close contact with the glass ; from its texture it excludes 

 too much light for the generality of Orchids and stove plants ; 

 from its colour it absorbs instead of reflects the heat of the 

 sun, and so the object of keeping down the temperature of the 

 air enclosed in the house is frustrated ; and from its close eon- 

 tact with the roof it almost hermetically seals it, except at the 

 ventilators proper, which have to be unduly opened to keep 

 down the heat, and the consequence is a violent rush of air 

 and_ moisture in one direction, which is most objectionable. 

 Look at Orchids under so dense a shade and in so stewing an 

 atmosphere, and it will be found that such as Vandas make 

 weakly, long, drooping leaves, and next to no bloom-spikes. 

 Now, if a light-coloured and thinner texture were used for 

 shade, and it were at the same time raised a few inches off 

 the surface of the glass so as to admit of an intermediate 

 current of air, the temperature inside would be kept cooler, 

 and the ingress and egress of air would go on at the lops 

 more, and there would be less cause for a violent rush of it 

 at any given point, and a better atmospheric condition would 

 be the result. 



" Indiscriminate and constant shading of certain numerous 

 plants the whole summer has long been a fashion, and is a 

 practice manifestly open to question. The object of shading 

 our too often very small glass houses is certainly to modify 

 temperature and evaporation as well as light ; and it may not 

 be too much to say, that if the former could be more fully 

 accomplished, and the latter secured in less degree, plants 

 would benefit immensely. Considering, as we do, this to be 

 a most important subject for the interchange of facts and 

 suggestions, we have made the foregoing remarks with the 

 view of eliciting the views and experience of our readers and 

 correspondents. Any society or individual that could afford 

 thoroughly to test more minutely which plants are benefited 

 and which are injured by our present tystem of shading, 

 would deserve well of the horticultural world." 



berries and Raspberries have rotted. Cherries have cracked, 

 Gooseberries are bursting on the trees, and Currants are 

 levelled to the ground. The loss must be very great to growers 

 in the districts where the wet and boisterous weather has been 

 the most prevalent. 



The medal which was awarded to Mr. Worthington G. 



Smith for his discovery of the Resting-spoees of Pekono- 

 sror.A INFESTANS in the tuber of the Potato was the Gold 

 Knightian, a more valuable award than the GoldBanksian. 



We have received from Mr. R. Gilbert of the Gardens, 



Burghley, a box containing some of the finest-grown and best- 

 ripened Figs we have ever eaten in this country. 



NOTES AND GLEANINGS. 

 We have great pleasure in announcing that the CouneU of 

 the Royal Horticultural Society have concluded teems with 

 Her Majesti's Commissioneks of the International Exhibi- 

 tion of 1851, and that the terms are alike fair and equitable 

 to both parties, the Royal Horticultural Society being now 

 placed in such a position as will enable it in the future to 

 pursue its course untrammelled with conditions which formerly 

 impeded its freedom of action. 



We learn from various sources that the continued 



BAINS have oansed great injury to the small fruits. Straw- 



THE OLD MARKET GARDENS and NURSERIES 

 OF LONDON.— No. 3. 



Of the land which was at the disposal of ecclesiastics in the 

 reign of the eighth Henry, there was the convent of the 

 Black Friars near the Thames at Ludgate ; the Grey Friars 

 in Newgate Street, near the site of Christ's Hospital ; the 

 Augustine Friars close to Broad Street, now shortened to 

 Austen Friars ; the White Friars, in or near Salisbury Square ; 

 the Crouched, Crossed (or as it is now distorted " Crooked") 

 Friars, in St. Olave's near Tower Hill; the Carthusian Friars 

 at the Charterhouse ; the Cistercian Friars, also called the New 

 Abbey, in East Smithfield ; and some friars who called them- 

 selves the " Brethren de Sacca," in Old Jewry. These latter 

 wandered about at times, I suppose to obtain contributions, 

 with bags or sacks, or perhaps the word applies to a particular 

 kind of robe or dress somewhat sacklike. All these probably 

 had plots of garden ground ; and besides these friaries there 

 were nunneries and priories, also monastic houses still more 

 in number called hospitals, with resident brotherhoods ; and 

 then there were the private domains of eccleeiastica, called by 

 the odd name of Inn in many instances, as in Chaucer's 

 immortal " Tabard Inn," once the residence of the Abbot 

 of Hyde. 



Air, shelter, and water are indispensable requisites of the 

 horticulturist, and the old gardens of Loudon City were well 

 favoured in these respects. They had plenty of xir necessarily, 

 from the scarcity of buildings at that time ; and those then 

 erected were clustered together, too, in an insalubrious way 

 for their occupants, yet they less interfered with the successful 

 culture of the gardens and orchards than if they had been die- 

 I persed over a larger space or carried up higher. But lofty 

 houses were exceptional. The forests of Middlesex and Essex 

 gave a capital screen from the north and east winds, and the 

 moisture that must have been present in the air more or less 

 at all times could not have been unfavourable. This arose 

 from the fenny lands, such as are kept in remembrance by the 

 names of Fenchurch, Finsbury, and Moorfields ; while to the 

 south much of Westminster and Lambeth was marsh, and the 

 road that Royalty had to travel to Chelsea and Kensington was 

 execrably bad, being both miry and stony. 



Nor should it be forgotten, when we are considering the 

 gardens of the London of our ancestors, that the land in the 

 central districts has undergone a notable elevation. Five 

 hundred years since, or four, three, or even two hundred years 

 ago, would exhibit it to us more undulating than at present, 

 but on the whole much lower, and therefore well sheltered. 

 Beneath the clay and loam, which with an occasional dash o£ 

 gravel constituted the subsoil, there was an abundance of 

 water, as shown by the numerous City wells ; so that it need 

 not surprise us that the fruit trees bore well and ripened their 

 fruit in most seasons, and that London was actually noted, not 

 only for its Vines but for its vineyards. Holeburne, or the 

 " Old Bourne," a rather famous streamlet in its day, which 

 has disappeared, leaving its name as a heritage to the mighty 

 Viaduct of Victoria's reign, had vineyards along its banks. 

 Vine Street in Westminster was so called from a vineyard close 

 by attached to the king's palace of Westminster. But one of 

 the most curious changes of name is connected with Vinegar 

 Yard in the unpromising vicinity of Drury Lane. This was 

 formerly Vine-garden Yard, so it is stated, though the vine- 

 yard had vanished and houses sprung up on the ground as far 

 back as 1G21. Ely Place, the town abode of the Bishops of 

 Ely, had its vineyard and large gardens — altogether a very 

 agreeable spot, as one understands from the description of it ; 

 and no doubt Bishop Cox, who had to relinquish it to Sir C. 

 Hatton, Queen Bess's dancing Chancellor, thought himself 

 hardly done by. Sir C. Hatton took the property in 157(J, at 



