General Notices. 337 



quantities, and sown over the plants. In a few days they will be com- 

 pletely clear of it, very much altered in color, and improved in growth. 

 [Gard. Gaz. 1843, jo. 440.) 



Charcoal. — Charcoal having been apparently successfully employed in 

 reference to plants and their food, may minister, I conceive, to vegetation 

 in a three-fold character, though certainly per se altogether insoluble, and 

 inert considered in relation to the assimilated food of plants. 1. Char- 

 coal is a powerful antiseptic, and may therefore correct the vitiated or 

 septic materials of a soil. 2. It is absorbent and retentive of moisture, 

 and the gases ; and the many volumes of ammoniacal and hydrochloric 

 gases it will absorb is quite remarkable. And 3dly, it is quite possible 

 that it may yield, in continuity, successive supplies of even carbonic acid 

 gas, to minister to vegetation ; as from some recent experiments it would 

 appear that nascent hydrogene was developed by the transit of steam 

 tlirough charcoal, the latter at the common temperature; which must 

 have been developed by the decomposition of the aqueous vapors, and the 

 consequent combination of the oxygene, which would form, in chemical 

 union with the carbon, carbonic acid gas. This aspect of the relations of 

 charcoal to vegetation I believe is novel ; at any rate, I have not before 

 met with it. [Gard. Gaz. 1843, p. 441.) 



To preserve late Grapes from mould or damping. — Instead of hanging 

 the bunch by the stalk or shoulder, string the bunch by two of the lowest 

 berries at the bottom, and inverted in a topsy-turvy position. I have kept 

 grapes longer and better this way than any other way I ever tried. You 

 will see at once, when the bunch is inverted and hung up, that the berries 

 do not touch each other, as they would do by being tied and hung up in 

 the usual Avay. [Gard. Gaz. 1S44, p. 9.) 



On Roses. — Closely associated with the love of roses is the very natural 

 desire to possess them in their greatest beauty ; and much of this neces- 

 sarily depends, not only on the skill and attention with which they may 

 be tended, but also, to an extent seldom appreciated, on the position or 

 situation in which they are grown. The proper station for this, the queen 

 of flowers, in our gardens has not yet met the attention we think it de- 

 serves. The best situation for a rosary, if choice can be made, is on a 

 gentle declivity, facing to the southeast; an easy slope is to be preferred, 

 because the plants receive more light, and are seen to greater advantage 

 than when growing on a level surface, and the compartment itself looks 

 larger ; and also because the superfluous moisture will pass off quickly in 

 such situations, for, though roses delight in a rich retentive soil, they re- 

 ceive much injury, in common with all plants, from stagnant aqueous 

 matter in the soil. 



In the disposition of the plants, the taste of the designer, aided by local 

 circumstances, must be the chief guide: a few general rules, however, 

 may assist the most refined ; thus, for instance, the superiority of an ar- 

 rangement would be self-evident in which the several families or classes 

 were in juxtaposition, allowing the hybrids or doubtful kinds to approach 

 the nearest to their affinities, so that if a division were occupied with the 

 varieties of China roses, the next should contain their hybrids, followed 

 by Perpetuals or Bourbons, according to the class the hybrids partake of: 

 the arrangement in the beds requires but little explanation, being only to 

 place the more vigorous kinds towards the centre, and to include as great 

 a variety of colors as possible. Standard roses are fine objects when 



VOL. X. NO. IX. 43 



