158 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES USED IN HORTICULTURE. 



balls; though, to convey the latter to any distance over rough roads, larger 

 wheels would be requisite than those which belong to the machine referred 

 to. See our Appendix. 



SECT. VI. Miscellaneous Articles used in Horticulture. 



In complete gardens, containing all the varieties of plant-structures, a 

 number of articles are required for the purposes of cultivation and high 

 keeping which can neither be classed as implements nor structures. Even 

 in the smallest gardens, mats for protection, props for support, nails and ties 

 for fastenings, and tallies for naming and numbering plants, are essential. 



444. Articles for protection. Bass mats, woven from ribands or strands of 

 the inner bark of the lime-tree, and imported from the Baltic, are in general 

 use, both to protect from the cold by counteracting radiation, and to shade 

 from the sun. Canvas, bunting, and netting of different kinds, and oiled 

 paper frames, are used for the same purposes. Netting of straw ropes, 

 formed by first stretching ropes as weft at regular distances, and then crossing 

 them by others as woof, are sometimes used to protect wall-trees. Another 

 mode of protecting trees by straw ropes, is by placing poles against the wall, 



1 in front of the trees, at from four feet to six feet asunder ; 



j thrusting their lower ends into the earth about eighteen inches 

 or t\vo feet from the wall, and making them fast at top to the 

 coping, or to the wall immediately under it ; straw or hay ropes 

 are then passed from pole to pole, taking a turn round each, 

 and leaving a distance of about eighteen inches between each 

 horizontal line of ropes. Straw ropes may also be used to pro- 

 tect early rows of peas or other plants, by first hooping over 

 each row, and afterwards passing three or four ropes from hoop 

 to hoop. Of course they act by checking radiation, and their 

 influence will be greatest when they are placed between a foot 

 and eighteen inches from the wall, the amount of heat reflected 

 back diminishing in a geometrical ratio according to the distance 

 Fig. 88. wup* of of the covering from the body to be protected. Wisps of straw 

 straw for being tied to a string, fig. 88, and hung in lines one above another in 



used at protect. ^ Q ^ Q f ft Wft ^ are ^ Q ^^ ^ ^ game p U1 .p oge as stmw 



ropes, and in sheltered places are perhaps better. 



445. Mats of straw or reeds are used for protecting plants in the open 

 garden, and also for covering glazed sashes, whether of pits, frames, or 

 hothouses. Every gardener ought to know how to construct these, in order 

 to be able to employ his men within-doors in severe weather. The following 

 directions are given by P. Lindegaard, late gardener to the king of Denmark, 

 who used them extensively, and who states, that they produce a considerable 

 saving of fuel, afford a great security from accidents, such as breaking glass, 

 and not only retain heat much better than bass mats, but, from their greater 

 porosity, allow the steam of moist hotbeds to pass off more readily. When 

 a heavy fall of snow takes place during the night, bass mats are not so easy 

 to get cleaned and dried the next morning as straw mats, because they 

 retain the moisture, and get frozen and stiff by the frost penetrating through 

 them ; and hence the next evening they cannot be put on again without the 

 risk of breaking the glass. Mr. Lindegaard found four hundred straw mats 

 sufficient to cover four hundred lights, for which if he had used bass mats, 

 about twelve hundred would have been required. These mats are made of 



