222 [Assembly 



used to cicatrize wounds. Now, when dissolved in ether, it 

 serves, under the name collodion, to furnish gardeners with an 

 unexpected means of multiplication of plants. 



Collodion is truly one of the most drying of varnishes — adhe- 

 sive, impenetrable to moisture and air. Mr. Lowe has availed 

 himself of these admirable qualities to multiply plants by the 

 cuttings. He supposed that by covering the lower end of the 

 cutting with collodion it would more slowly absorb the mois- 

 ture from the soil, and thus cause the cuttings to take with great- 

 er ease. He therefore applied a covering of collodion over the end 

 of the branch taken from the tree. In five or six seconds this 

 covering became dry, and the juices of the branch hermetically 

 sealed up. The budding is afterwards done in the ordinary way. 



In order to try the plan thoroughly, Mr. Lowe made compara- 

 tive experiments. The cuttings were divided into many parcels, 

 each having the same number of species. Some had colloc'ion 

 applied, others none. The plants were selected both from the 

 conservatories and from open air. The experiments proved the 

 great superiority of the plants with collodion. It is good for 

 grafts, and better when over it a thin slip of gutta percha is put. 



THE ORANGE GROVES OF BLIDAH, IN ALGERIA. 

 An important matter for Blidah and Koleah. They have grow- 

 ing 23,680 orange trees, giving them an annual revenue of I14,8d5 

 francs, upwards of $22,000. This does not include the citrons, 

 lemons, cedrats and bergamots. 



An Arab never labors in his orange garden. He never prunes 

 or manures his trees, and gathers stinted, poor fruit. Orange 

 flower water can be made largely and profitably. 



[Annales de la Societe Imperiale d'Horticulture, Paris, March, 1855.] 



Mr. Jamin asserts that pears grafted upon seedling pear stocks 

 are never as good as on quince stocks ; that the seedling stock 

 sends its tap roots deep into the soil in a perpendicular direc- 

 tion, which causes the tree to be slow in making fruit, and their 

 juices to be watery, being drawn from the lower bed of the soil, 

 where the root is deprived of the beneficent action oftheatmos- 



