1843.] 
THE GARDENERS 
CHRONICLE. 
837 
MYATI'S NEW SEEDLING STRAWBERRY. : 
IT are now ready to send out their 
atthe same time a profusion of fine fruit and bloom on ee Bane 
i ‘ WD 
N.B.—“ Cormack’s Early Kent Peas,” 148. per bushel. 
Newcross, and Bedford Conservatory, Covent Garden, Nov. 24. 
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1848. 
MEETINGS FOR THE LLOWING WEEKS. 
‘Tuuspay, Dec. 5, Horticultural « ie a 
» 1” Linnea «ee + BPO 
‘Wronvspay, Dec. 6, Society of Arts + + BPM 
Framay, Dec. 15, Botanical oe a BPS 
Warn the Garpmners’ Carontcie was established 
the proprietors did not contemplate the admission of 
Agriculture into its columns, except to a limited extent. 
But the @ifferent branches of cultivation prove insepa- 
rable, Gardening was, in fact, the mother of Farming ; 
and the parent will not be divided from her offspring. 
Our correspondence also tells us that a large number of 
the readers of the GARDENERS’ CHRONICLE are greatly 
interested in Agriculture, and anxious to obtain the same 
amount of information upon that subject as has been 
afforded relating to Horticulture ; and this has gradually 
led to occupying a larger space with Agriculture than the 
demands of Horticulture will permit. 
In order to remedy this, and at the same time to 
meet fully the interests of the Agricultural community, 
the Proprietors have determined to enlarge their Paper, 
permanently, to the size of 72 columns; of which the 
customary space will be occupied with general news, 
and the remainder will be divided between Horticulture 
and Agriculture. They do not, however, on this account 
Propose to increase the price; on the contrary, they 
are happy to show their sense of the favourable reception 
which their Journal has already met with, by making 
it one-half larger without further charge. 
At the commencement, we undertook that the Gar- 
pDrngeRs’ Curonicix should become a well-conducted 
channel for the diffusion of sound Horticultural science 
and practice, and that it should be, at the same time, a 
field in which all questions connected with the subject 
could be discussed in a gentlemanly manner. The large 
sale of the Paper shows that this promise has been kept. 
The same plan will be followed in the Agricultural de- 
partment. The science of Agriculture, its practice in all 
its bearings, and the many details connected with so vast 
a subject, will form topics of consideration and of tem- 
Pperate discussion. Political questions will be avoided ; our 
field willbe the Farm. While other Journals are absorbed 
in ephemeral disputes concerning matters of human legis- 
lation, we hope to be engaged in the investigation and appli- 
cation of those great truths which regulate the actions 
of plants and animals, and which no change of times 
or human laws can affect. The discovery of a new 
truth in Vegetable or Animal Physiology—a new imple- 
Ment—or a new or improved point in Agricultural prac- 
tice, will be of more permanent interest than the most 
triumphant settlement of some disputed point in the 
Politics of the day. 
Ttis needless to repeat the hacknied phrases that have 
become current in speaking of the high station claimed 
by Agriculture among human affairs. Man acknowledges 
aug Paramount importance 5 the vast interests connected 
with it speak in a louder voice than the flourishes of 
“ratorical trumpets. But its actual condition, whether 
We consider it as an art or as a science, is not so well 
understood, ‘There are those who imagine that a subject 
which has engaged the attention of mankind from the 
Creation cannot now require further investigation ;—there 
are others who declare it to be only in its infancy: and 
certainly, when we look to the mechanical improve- 
ments now making in rural implements, and to the 
large strides that have been lately made towards more 
Correct views in the Chemistry and Physiology of the 
organic world, the latter would seem to be the more just 
Spinion ; this is, however, what our columns will assist 
in determining. 
aa et us, however, not be misunderstood. We have no 
ught of exalting science over practice. We are no 
advocates of inconsiderate speculation. We fully re- 
Cognise the impossibility of applying abstract principles to 
“Udvation without an int with cir 
. + ‘ : 
often as varying as places. We admit that, upon some 
cw the opinion of a good ploughman, who has never 
itred from his farm, is precisely that which a wise 
man would first consult. We condemn the idea of con- 
ducting farming operations upon one invariable plan, and 
while we welcome science as the best auxiliary of practice, 
we regard crude scientific speculations as the most dan- 
gerous of delusions. But,on the other hand, we feel that 
in Agriculture, as in all other arts, there are great general 
principles upon which successful farming must neetssarily 
depend ; that there are practical errors which no local 
circumstances can justify ; that there is room for improve- 
ment even in those branches of husbandry which are best 
understood; and, in short, that Agriculture offers one of 
the richest fields in which men of talent may labour. 
Of course the Editor of the Horticultural Department 
does not také upon himself the management of that of 
Agriculture. His ground is the garden, and to that he will 
confine himself. The charge of the Agricultural Depart- 
ment will be confided to a gentleman well acquainted with 
the best kind of farming, in which he is actively engaged, 
and supported by the communications of our most distin- 
guished farmers. The AGRICULTURAL GazreTre—for 
such will be the name of the new part—will therefore, like 
the Garpenrrs’ CuRonrcLe, not be confined to an 
exposition of the views of a few individuals, but will 
become a record of the opinions of all the most distin- 
guished practical and scientific men of the age. 
Tuar one of the best treatises we have on the Pine- 
apple is that of Mr. Glendinning,* is well known to'gar- 
deners. It will not diminish the reputation of the book 
when we state that the large Queens lately sent to Lon- 
don from Longleat have been obtained by following its 
directions in most respects. We shall therefore— 
without pledging ourselves to defend all Mr. Glendin- 
ning’s principles, some of which, in fact, we think will 
not bear strict examination—proceed to explain what 
we conceive to be the important points in his code of 
instructions. 
The first, and we apprehend the most essential 
circumstance upon which he relies is the growing 
his plants slowly at first, and rapidly afterwards. Itis 
a certain law in Vegetable Physiology that plants 
which grow fast when young never carry good fruit. 
It is, indeed, impossible that they should: for how can 
we expect vigour in old age from debility in youth? 
and rapid growth when young is inevitably attended by 
debility. Plants grow ‘fast, but acquire no solidity. 
They are like children who shoot up at once into the 
stature of manhood, and immediately afterwards 
perish of consumption; or they may be likened to 
those Fungi which are formed in a day, and rot in an 
hour. This truth, which is just as applicable to 
Melons, Strawberries, Peaches, and Vines, as to Pine- 
apples, is, as we conceive, the corner-stone of Mr. 
Glendinning’s system. 
If,” says Mr. Glendinning, “ the Pine-apple in its 
younger state is supplied with the same amount of 
heat and moisture as are required in ripening the 
fruit, the foliage would become drawn and slender, and 
the whole plant so constitutionally weak, that nothing 
put puny fruit could be produced.” In fact, the sue- 
cession-house and the fruiting-house are managed upon 
avery different plan, the temperature of the former 
peing from 11° to 16° below the latter, as is shown in 
the following Table :— 
MONTHLY TABLE OF TEMPERATURE. 
Pit. Sto 
January 54 
February 56 
March 57 
April 59 
May 60 
June 61 
July 62 
Aupiust 62 
September 60 
ber 58 
November 56 
December 54 2 
Mr. Glendinning regards 
the natural habit of the Pine (p. 12) ; but in thathe is 
mistaken. The Pine grows in the cool season and 
fruits in the hot season in its native habitation, and 
there is scarcely less than 16° of difference between 
these two periods. For instance, at Nassau, where the 
Providence Pines are found, the difference is from 14° 
to 15°; and in some parts of India it amounts to as 
much as 80°. It is true that these variations of season 
are not applicable when Pines are several seasons 
pefore they fruit ; but then very fine Pines are always 
produced on young plants, for the whole of whose 
growth two seasons—the cool and the hot one—are suffi- 
cient. When the vicissitudes of six seasons, or three 
years, are allowed to operate on Pines, as Mr. Speede 
says is the case in Calcutta, nothing but bad fruit will 
be the result. In fact, this writer, with the climate of 
India at his back, thinks a Pine of six or seven pounds 
a prodigy ! 
In the next place, the Pine-houses are provided with 
the means of obtaining milk-warm water for syringing 
and watering. ‘This, which is so often neglected, is a 
capital point in the cultivation of all tropical plants, 
which are unacquainted with the low temperature of 
+} Practical Hints on the Culture of the Pinc-apple.. By R. 
Glendinning, 1Qm0, 1839; pp 55, 
northern countries in any shape,’ and unprovided with 
the means of resisting its effects. It is of little use to 
maintain a steady bottom-heat, or a steady air-heat, if 
the warmth of the soil or of the leaves is to be sud- 
denly lowered six or seven degrees by a deluge of cold 
water. Tender plants do not like shower-baths. 
Steam is admitted to the air when necessary, so as 
to maintain a due atmospheric moisture. A steady, 
uninterrupted growth is to be secured at all times. 
Liquid manure is given abundantly ; the dung of 
sheep or deer, steeped for a long time in water, being 
used for this purpose. Finally, a stiff turfy loam 
mixed with sheep or deer dung, is recommended as 
the soil; but as the Pine-apple grows capitally at 
Versailles in peat, and at home in sand, it does not 
appear to us that the soil isa very important consi- 
deration, provided it is open. 
Such appear to us to be the main features in Mr. 
Glendinning’s practice. There is, however, still a 
point of perhaps as much importance as the others. 
At p. 35 we are told that few persons acquainted with 
the management of Pine plants are ignorant of the 
injury consequent on any sudden change of treatment, 
and of the certain destruction that follows unexpected 
transitions. Again, at p. 47 it is directed that if large 
fruit is wanted, plenty of pot room should be allowed. 
But then at p. 23 it is said, that the gardener must 
always guard against over-potting, and the system of 
frequent shifts is there laid down as the rule to be fol- 
lowed. That the first rule is right and the second 
wrong we have entertained no doubt ; but for the sake 
of being sure that good practice did not contradict good 
theory we wrote to Mr. Murray, to inquire which of 
these two methods he followed. His answer is as 
we expected, that he adopts the large shift system, and 
to a much greater extent than is recommended by 
Mr. Glendinning, and that he proposes to carry it still 
further next year. We have some reason to believe that 
this is also the plan at Bicton, and we regard it asthe 
certain precursor of getting rid of potting altogether. 
Atail events, we shall soon know how Mr. Barnes does 
manage his Pines, for we understand that a full 
account of his practice may be expected in the 
« Gardeners’ Magazine” of January next. 
the experiment of Mr. Archdale Palmer, on trans- 
planting the roots of Wheat after separating them 
into several plants by splitting. The experiment is 
by no means new ; and the result, in many instances, 
perfectly astonishing. The increase from one grain 
sown ¢arly in the season, by repeatedly dividing the 
plants as they throw out tillers, amounts to many 
thousands; and by this means valuable varieties may 
be rapidly brought into general cultivation. But all 
the experiments which have been made have been on 
a small scale, and in gardens, or at least in very mellow 
well-prepared soils ; and it appears, at first sight, that 
however great the saving of seed might be, if the 
practice of splitting the roots were to become general, 
and supposing that hands could be obtained in suffi- 
cient numbers, without raising the fair wages of 
labour, to extend the plan to considerable farms, the 
saving of seed-wheat would be sufficient to supply 
food for a greatly increased population. We have 
employed experienced practical labourers to calculate 
the fair value of the additional manual labour required 
in planting, dividing, and replanting Wheat on an 
acre of land ; but the results differ so widely, ranging 
from 19s. to 60s., that without actually planting a 
considerable portion of land with Wheat in this way, 
and keeping yery minute accounts of the expense, it 
will be impossible to decide whether it could be 
recommended, generally, as economical. 
The only way to ascertain this is to let it be fairly 
tried by experiment, the details of which must be 
stated as follows :— 
Digging and preparing seed-bed, 1 square perch £— — 
Didbling 4g4 secds at 9 inches each way, 
hour’s wor! 
d dividing 
hours 
th, and raking the 
plants, hours 
Dividing each of these into 3 
Raking the ground, &c. 
Transplanting 17,424 plants 
[ef tele 
Pek Eibst 
aaa a 
Sige 
Suppose each plant cccupies a square of 9 inches, 
this number of plants will cover very little more than 
52 square perches, just one-fifth of an acre ; so that 
a whole acre, treated in this way, would cost in 
labour five times the estimated amount. 
The farther we go on in the division, the greater the 
labour and the chance of plants failing. Every time 
the roots are divided and _ replanted,» the ground 
should have some stirring, if ouly a harrowing or 
raking, which last would be easiest, as a raker could 
follow the person who divided the roots, and level the 
holes made by taking up the plants. Compare this 
tedious operation with dibbling 5 pecks of seed at 
85, per acre, as is donein Suffolk and Norfolk, There 
