Effects of the Winter of 18S7-8 at Dropmore. 631 



known, and may be seen on application in the proper quarter, 

 that persons are to be found, who, for a proper compensation, 

 will build an apparatus substantial as a piece of ordnance, and 

 simple as the teakettle, on a principle that has stood the test of 

 ten years hard forcing, with no more than a couple of potfuls of 

 water poured into it every year. 



Now, as regards vapour in hot-houses, though its use is gene- 

 rally acknowledged, scarcely an instance is to be met with where 

 the necessary supply can be commanded. The mere sprinkling 

 of the flue or pipes with water now and then is by no means 

 adequate to the wants of vegetation ; neither is a potful or two of 

 water left standing on the flue, for syringing the plants with, or 

 to mix with a quantity of cold water to be applied to their roots, 

 anything like a summer shower, which is the natural provision 

 adapted to the wants of vegetation. All this may be remedied 

 by the following arrangement. The hot-water boiler should be 

 either in the stock-hole, or in such a convenient part of the 

 house, as to allow a cistern built of bricks and cement over it, 

 containing water from the eaves, and having also a pipe connected 

 with a pump or reservoir for a supply in dry weather; and from 

 this cistern a lead pipe or an iron one (but, if iron is used, the 

 holes must be bushed with brass, otherwise the rust would soon 

 close them\ having bristle-sized holes bored in its upper surface, 

 about 12 in. apart, laid perfectly level over the top of the flues 

 or pipes, and this supply of water regulated by a cock, which 

 will give vapour to any extent, and the cistern will give a supply 

 of soft warm rain water for the roots ; the very thing that nature 

 would have supplied in the proper season for watering them in 

 their native countries. 



London, Septemhcr 21. 1838. 



Art. VI. An Account of the Effects of the severe Winter o/^ 1837-8 

 on the Pinetum at Dropmore. By Mr. Frost, Gardener there. 



I HAVE now found time to send you a list of plants that 

 suffered from the intense frosts of last winter. Pinus insignis is 

 dead. — P. mitis, after living several winters, quite dead. You 

 remark, in your Arboretum Britannicum, this is not mitis, which, 

 probably, is the case. — P. longifolia is dead, under a very thick 

 covering. — P. Pinea. Many plants much injured, where ex- 

 posed to the east wind. — P. leiophyllum. Dead, after living 

 out several winters ; and one plant, which was protected, is much 

 injured. — P. canariensis. Under cover, branches killed back 

 to near the trunk, breaking from the trunk and thick part of the 

 branches. — P. halepcnsis. An exposed plant; started in the 

 spring, but has very recently died : those in more sheltered si- 

 tuations are much injured, particularly the branches near the 



