37—1846. | 
THE GARDENERS’ CHRONICLE. ies 611 
GROOM, Crarnam Riss, near Lonpon (removed 
from Walworth), by APPOINTMENT FLORIST TO HER 
MAJESTY THE QUEEN, and to Hrs MAJESTY THE KING OF SAXONY, 
begs to call the attention of the Nobility, Gentry, and Amateurs 
to the following new and rare Plants :— 
Epacris lævigata. . 
6| — elegans . 
5.0| Leianthus nigrescens 
6 — I 
— ns 
6| Columnea crassifolia 
2 
2 
Siphocamphylus coccinea 2 
3 6 | Corokia buddlioides 
2 
5 
3 
2 
Stylidium androsacea 
Chirita sinensis .. 
6| Bouvardia flava .. . 
0|Platycodon grandiflorum 
3 6| Gardenia Sherbournii 
6| Garrya laurifolia 
6| Ruellia montana 
3 6|Mussænda frondosa 
36| — macrophylla 
6 | Geranium Duke of H; 
Epacris 5 ton po m . 
Foreign orders executed, and the Trade supplied on the usual 
terms, A remittance will be expected with orders from un- 
known correspondents. $ 
BECK'S SEEDLING PELARGONIUMS. 1845 
M BECK having now sent out the Plants, secured 
do by pre-payment, informs the Publio the following 
varieties only can be had, well established in 4-inch Pots. The 
usual allowance'to the Trade. 
. ..£2 2 0]|Bacchus I 
Resplendent 
— an 
Tetratheca hirsuta. 
Angelonia floribunda 
Tacsonia mollissima 
icata, 
emat; 
ni 
. .. £111 6 
Hebe's Lip.. 110 Hu 1) 
Competitor .. 111 6| Gigantic .. 010 6 
For Prepayment only. Post Office orders are requested on 
Brentford. , 
N.B. A few sets of strong Plants rémain of the seedlings 
of 1844, 
The Gardeners’ Chronicle. 
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1846. 
MEETINGS FOR THE TWO FOLLOWING WEEKS. 
"WizbwzspAY,Sept.ló—Royal South London... Pat, 
COUNTRY SHOWS. 
WpwsspAv, Sept. 16— Norfolk and Norwich Horticultural. 
sus 134 Perthshire Horticultural, 
3 — 18) Chichester Horticultural, 
Some causes were tried at Liverpool the other 
day, which, on many accounts, and especially be- 
Cause their object was one intimately connected 
with the purposes of this Paper, deserve more than 
a passing notice; for they involved facts and 
Opinions which may any day concern everybody 
who has a plantation, garden, or farm. 
The plaintiff in this case was Sir Jogx GERARD, 
Bart., the representative of one of the oldest fami- 
lies in Lancashire, and the possessor of large estates 
in that county. He claimed compensation of the 
defendants, who are proprietors of certain alkali 
works, established in his neighbourhood, for exten- 
Sive damage alleged to have been done to his tim- 
ber by the vapour proceeding from their chimneys. 
The defendants denied the existence of any such 
vapour as could produce injury to trees at the dis- 
tance of one or two miles ; they denied that an 
injury had in fact been done to the timber except 
by the plaintiff's own acts, or by game, rabbits or 
lusects, or by natural causes; and they asserted 
that if any damage had been done it was not caused 
by themselves more than by the chimneys of col- 
leries, copper works, and glass works, also in the 
neighbourhood. 
lt is needless to refer to that evidence which 
Went to show that no damage had been done, for it 
Was proved by witness after witness that the injury 
Sustained by the timber had been enormous; that 
Or years past all formal thinning had become need- 
less, in consequence of the extensive death of the 
trees, and two witnesses, timber valuers, one of 
whom was Mr. Wuattzy, the nurseryman, of Liver- 
Pool, gave evidence that the injury done to the trees 
amounted in value to nearly 60007, and that it took 
them four weeks to make the valuation. 
Injury of the most extensive kind was proved 
en to have been committed. But how? The 
Plaintiff said by the alkali works ; and he rested his 
ase upon the fact that the trees most exposed to 
the works were most injured ; that they had been 
healthy until the alkali works were put in action ; 
that they had continued to decline ever since ; that 
the destruction of the trees consisted in their leaves 
emg scorched or browned; that they then be- 
Came “stag-headed,” and that there was no appa- 
Tent cause for this sudden change from a state of 
vigour to one of rapid decay, except the presence 
9f noxious acrid vapour in the air. That such 
Vapour was discharged from the defendants? chimney 
Into the plaintiff's park and grounds was proved by 
Persons who had watched it; that it was of a very 
acrid nature was proved by those whose eyes had 
Smarted from it, and who had coughed when it 
tered their lungs, although two miles of. That 
ese symptoms indicate the presence of muriatic 
acid gas ; that muriatic acid gas is largely thrown 
Pa by the chimneys of alkali works, and that it pro- 
uces noxious effects’ on plants similar to those 
which are observed in the plaintiff's woods was 
80 conclusively established. 
any of the arguments adduced by the defend- 
ants to show that they were not guilty would be 
unworthy of notice if it were not that hereafter 
similar cases may arise, and ignorant men again be 
put into a witness box who may have more weight 
with a jury, or may be brought before a less intelli- 
gent judge than Mr. Justice Cresswett. One 
opinion was that a great storm, which took place 
on the 6th January, 1839, and did much injury to 
shipping on the Lancashire coast, might have been 
the remote cause. In support of this, one Dick 
was produced, who swore that he was a gardener in 
the neighbourhood ; that in his judgment the frosty 
wind of January 6th did all the mischief, and that 
severe frost between November and March injures 
forest trees! It happened, however, that it rained 
pouring all that night; and as for the action of 
frost during winter on Oaks and Ashes, Mr. Dicx's 
opinion did not weigh with the jury. 
more favourite ground was bad drainage, and 
unsuitable soil. Butit was proved that the greatest 
mischief was on hill sides and on slopes, where no 
water could lodge ; that the least injury was in| 
hollows, where only the drainage could be insuf- 
ficient; and that there was not anywhere the 
slightest sign of “ mossiness," which is an invariable 
accompaniment of disease in wet land. As to the 
soil, it was proved to be good stiff loam, perfectly 
suited to the growth of trees. Nothing has more 
surprised us than to find men, called respectable, 
exposing their credit or their judgment to peril, by 
such testimony as was given on the part of the de- 
fendants as to these two points. We happen to 
know the country, and to have seen these trees, 
and we can say that we never heard of statements 
more totally destitute of foundation than some of 
those made for the defence. In some places 
the trees are on the slopes of rich meadows, 
in others on the sides of gulleys or steep hollows ; 
as for the soil, much of it is capital Wheat land, 
which would let for 37. per Cheshire acre; and, 
moreover, the whole question ofbad land or bad 
drainage is settled by the faet that uninjured trees 
in high vigour are intermingled withthe dying, and 
that the latter were in the greatest luxuriance until 
they were destroyed by the decay that has lately 
attacked them, in the manner already described. 
Of course the jury found for the plaintiff. 
But although no possible doubt exists that the 
iischief was caused by the acrid vapour proceeding | 
from the chimn of the alkali-works, there were 
Some curious circumstances that required expla- 
nation, independently of some apocryphal state- 
ments to which we need not allude. 
t was a great fact that the injury was chiefly 
done to Oaks and Ashes and Larehes. Not that 
other trees escaped; on the contrary, Limes, | 
Beech, Spanish Chesnuts, and Elms furnished their 
quota, but to an inconsiderable amount. Hazel 
we believe escaped altogether, and Alders, Syca- 
mores, and young Scotch Firs suffered little, if at 
all. Old Scotch Firs were,however, greatly damaged. 
This is no doubt connected with the powers which 
different trees possess of resistine external poisons. 
The Oak, Larch, and Ash, are the most tender 
leaved of our forest-trees when the leaves are young, 
and it might be expected that they should be most 
easily injured by muriatie acid gas. The Syca- 
more, on the contrary, is naturally able to resist the 
sea-spray, which has an analogous action to that of 
muriatic acid gas; Hazels and Beech are guarded 
by their copious hairs; Alders by their glutinous 
varnish. Besides which, plants certainly have, like 
animals, specific powers of resisting poisons ; and 
therefore it does not follow that because A and C 
are killed by x, that therefore B D and E shall 
also die. A dog is not killed by dropping hydro- 
cyanie acid, perhaps the most subtle of all poisons, 
upon its skin; a horse will take a pint of castor-oil 
without danger ; rhubarb will not act upon him at 
all, though it produces its usual effects on a eat ; 
and opium, which so readily stupifies man, will 
hardly operate in that way on a dog. 
We have before us the result of some little ex- 
periments which prove this conclusively. A dose 
of chlorine which killed all the foliage of Escallonia 
tubra, hardly touched a Cineraria guarded by its 
naturai wool, and did not in any way affect the 
young tender expanded leaves of Berberis aquifo- 
lium, although the old leaves were destroyed ! 
another case, when a strong dose of muriatic acid 
gas was thrown into a box containing various 
branches newly cut in the autumn from. the trees, 
the following was found to be their condition 12 
hours after the experiment :— 
Scotch Fir.— Little affected. 
Larch.—Nearly every leaf killed. 
Ash.—Every leaf killed. 
Oak.— Y oungest leaves “only injured—old leaves not. 
W hitethorn.— Youngest leaves killed—old, browned 
at the edges in various degrees, or not affected. 
Sycamore.—Some leaves quite uninjured— others 
5 
half killed—others quite. The leaves were only 
affected where the corrosive vapour had been 
condensed upon them in considerable quantity. 
Alder.—Old leaves safe—younger leaves variously 
affected and curled. 
Hazel.—Ditto ditto. 
Elms.—Ditto ditto. 
Grass.—Variously but not much affected —a good 
deal quite green. Some quite brown. 
Another curious circumstance on which the 
defendants’ counsel much relied was. the presence 
of single dying trees among others that appeared 
uninjured, For example, a “stag-headed” Oak 
might be found among healthy Oaks, a dead Spanish 
Chesnut tree in a wood near where another escaped, 
and so on. This was true; and it was argued 
that such cases completely overset the opinion that 
injury to the trees was caused by noxious matter 
brought to them through the air from a distance ; 
for, said counsel, *if the cause were referable to 
vapour, clumps of trees and not isolated trees would 
have been withered and destroyed." But these 
'ases admit of an easy and satisfactory explanation, 
independently of the fact that they formed a great 
exception to the rule, which was that the trees did 
die in long lines or large patches. There can be 
no doubt that individuals of the same species have 
different vital powers; that what physiologists call 
idiosyncrasy, occurs among plants. as woll as 
animals, and that one individual is susceptible of a 
dose of poison which would be disregarded by 
another. In all epidemies the weakest persons 
perish first ; if vermin attack animals the unhealthy: 
are first seized upon ; one man is intoxicated by a 
glass of wine, another will drink his bottle: one 
Another near it, in full vigour, resists the action so 
far as not immediately to die ; but it is injured and 
ecomes unhealthy, and when again exposed to a 
sufficient dose is advanced another stage in its down- 
ward road ; and this action going on at various 
times, under various circumstances, will of itself 
produce a complicated result, The end of it, how- 
ever, will be the destruction of all the trees capable 
of being affected at all, and the result in Sir Joan 
Gerarp’s case must be the total destruction of all 
his timber, uuless he can put a stop to the opera- 
tions of his alkaline enemies. We need not add 
that what has been the fate of this gentleman's 
property wil be the fate of everybody's who 
permits such works to be established in his 
neighbourhood. 
As the season wears on new facts slowly accu- 
mulate, and add to the puzzles of the PorATo 
UESTION, without assisting in its solution. We 
may briefly advert to afew of them. " 
There is no doubt that diseased Potatoes left in 
the ground all winter have produced as good, and 
in many cases a better erop, than sound Potatoes 
planted in spring. Of this we have many examples. 
A very curious fact has been pointed out by Mr. 
C. Ewrne, gr. to O. F. Meyrick, Esq., at Bodorgan, 
in Anglesey. He had a frame of forced Potatoes, 
early in the present year, which were attacked by 
disease, as we ourselves can testify. Nevertheless 
the crop was matured, and placed ina dry shed, 
and “strange as it may appear,” we quote Mr, 
Ewrno’s words, “every one of them are to the pre- 
sent hour as sound as Potatoes can be, even the 
very smallest of them, and not a trace of the pre- 
vailing disease to be seen, and the Potatoes are now 
beginning to shoot, and have showed no signs of pre- 
mature growth. It appears extraordinary that forced 
Potatoes should have kept all these months after 
being attacked early in their growth by the disease, 
As for myself I cannot in any way account for the 
singularity further than supposing that the consti- 
tution of the plant has been regenerated by an early 
habit of growth.” 
second peculiarity is the indestructibility of 
the old set. We have ourselves found, in heavy 
land, that certain of the old sets of last year, the 
tops of which are blighted, remain perfectly sound, 
and are changed to a firm waxy mass. Sir ČHARLES 
Lemon has remarked the same thing in Cornwall. 
In a field of 53 acres, belonging to a friend, from 
