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1844.] 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE. 



279 



-T^TZ^th&t^ valuable piece of Plate be given in 

 WBd. the «*c rc "r> . best brace of Cucum bers . to be competed 



February ne « ™ nera ot First Prizes, at any Show during the 



for only u; u 

 ot year. 



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NOTICES of NEW PLANTS WHICH ARE EITHER 



USEFUL OR ORNAMENTAL. 



iwf" «°Z N ^ (T^ree-styled Flax). (Stove Perennial.) 

 rip.^ ,'• Pentandr,a Pentasrynia.— Seeds of this attractive spe- 

 anr f Lri nUm Were receiv ed by Major Francis, Madden-hall, 



hrorhpT » u a '!, y ^ ther Seeds aud bulbs » were Presented to his 



IrHarH i« u a ' sq '' of Narrow Water House, Warren Point, 



has hn'J" ! r h °K Se "? ve jt Sewered about December, 1837. It 



forwIfinS* , n ee 2 Ion,fknown inthe stoves of this country; 



Zlch ??$'« ?!' l mith '* E^tic Botany for 1785. a figure of it 



sTort tiLnrp dt0l l ave been taken fr " ra a PlMt that flowered a 



a t SdoTn?!^ ^ 10u 4 s f y K lntb e stove of the Hon. Charles Greville, 



P lant ha w»' * thon 6 h * will thus be perceived that the 



i atp re -nrh ? lt,vated in Englandfor more than fifty years, it 



«or neth thtp ra ' e 7 met V th ; yet « as jt P^duccs its flowers 



Wul verv IhnnH W1 !! ter montb s, and as those are highly beau- 



« e £ ' t f ' and rcmain expanded a long time; and 



ftraeritsamU eWIHevery easil y P^pagated ai.d cultivated, 



«Wed andT n h ™ orc «'ended circulation than it has yet re- 



Plant. ' n ernw B ? Ub Cd ! y a most ^sirable and valuable stove 



ttoold, decavpd 1 y m a com P° st of e Q ual parts of heath. 



P°W. and iud l nn V f S> and hsht loam ' Provided it be carefully 



cannot endi™ 11 Y waterc(I > f( ' r . as the rogts are small, they 



re adi\y rnulti,L,i k lmmodera te supply of water. It may be 



to the same o?a™« y cu,tto W of the half-ripened wood, planted 



aot.bed,underah? e H m . 0resandj ' soi, » anc » plunged in a gentle 



Ce »ved from Mr Jl na "8 |as8 « If i a communication which we re- 



appears to consider £ ™, an ' wMle grardener to R. Hall. Esq., he 



» 'sa South Amprioi ^umera elegansof Otto, and also that 



the L. trigvnum fi t a , nSpecieS; but jt is obviously identical with 



wher eitisdisti»" ct rv^ re f l D tbe B "tanical Magazine, t. 1100, 



Possess specimens , f ff ■ dto bean Ea st Indian plant; and as we 



introduced from t».I 5 lM ful1 flower at Chatsworth which were 



Dukeof DevonshirJc *«* Il,dies b ^ Mr ' «>bson, his Grace the 



lhe East Indies . »! Col ! e , ctor » tbe f act of its being a native of 



Cm >nentBotanist S ha I beV(),,a a " doubt; and though some 



il yasDenp C Vi av ; ebeenledto question whether tuis plant 



believe, been sepa- 

 is derived from the 



nuwwn n..r.i - ' probably in allusion 



"« applied. The v, f "i Purposes to which some of the species 



•r* K?.!- " am . e . i3 .Peculiar to this plant, on ac 



with three distinct styles.— 



5 >anl or its tlfurZ T c - Clfic na me is 



V Botany. 



ZWonHa^™ MEMORANDA. 

 of D - GumeJ % * or / ^— This place, which is the seat 



of L ynn,andcom!!?■ , ^ 8ltuatcd two mile s from the seaport 

 COuntr 7- It is w ? • * fine P ros pect of the surrounding 

 , P ared in addincr 7 P m good 0rder » and no expense is 

 ?/ P la nts already ?' ery n 1 ovelt y to the excellent collection 

 r l \ P ,a ce are tiT' ■ is worth y of cultivation. At 



by W eekt f about ?K; ine " eS that were erected and heated 

 ^ On8t ^ctions of M/v e y ea ™ 8i nce ; they are very perfect 



T SSible ^gree of Lwu » The Vines are in the » highest 

 ^? nd season ofb h pfl h ' T d akhou ^ th « is only the 

 TK frUit - The;l r ^ a ;^ th^ey are producing a fine crop 

 It^er. The 7 cJum y K CredUa J ble to the gardener, Mr. 

 ^L c l d arl y the f^™ ' « "d Melons are also good, 



^ p 2 ' ln che 8 lon e Th Cral ° f which ™«we from 20 

 * ere > ^hich are well ™ ,S L fine coll ection of Heaths 



eU grown ' Mir. Thrower does not prac- 



tise the one-shift system in the cultivation ot any of his 

 plants. Pelargoniums are as well grown here as at any 

 place that I have seen round London ; two specimens, 

 viz., Rising Sun and Sunshine, are very fine. Mr. 

 Thrower has succeeded in raising some good seedling 

 Cinerarias. There is likewise here a good collection of 

 Pinuses, to which a great number has been added this 

 season. — J. Stewart, Crimplesham. 





Miscellaneous. 



Poisoning by Darnel (Lolium Temulentum), with the 

 Means of Detecting this Seed when mixed with Wheat 

 Flour. — M. Rustini was charged with the analysis of some 

 bread which had rendered ill twenty women employed in 

 a silk manufactory. These women, after having eaten it, 

 were seized with somnolency, with a universal convul- 

 sive tremor, accompanied by coldness of the extremities. 

 When this bread was presented to him, it was gray, com- 

 pact, heavy, and of a disagreeable odour, and reminded 

 the author of the examples of adulteration by means of 

 alum or sulphate of copper with Wheat Flour; but he 

 did not find the characters which these salts present. He 

 then thought of the lime and of the arsenic which agri- 

 culturists employ in the operation of liming ; then he 

 proceeded to analysis, and he found in the bread a greater 

 quantity of lime than is ordinarily met with, which he at- 

 tributed to the water used in its preparation. He then 

 asked for a sample of the flour, thinking that it might 

 contain some organic principle which might have been 

 altered or disguised by the action of fire ; but he experi- 

 enced considerable delay in procuring it, and in the mean- 

 time the manager of the manufactory in which the women 

 were employed went to the baker, and, after reproaches 

 and threats, obtained from him the avowal that the miller 

 had sometimes furnished to him flour containing Lolium. 

 The physician, thinking that he recognised the symptoms 

 of poisoning caused by this substance, administered emetic 

 and emulsions, and all the symptoms were soon dissipated. 

 The affair rested here. However, says M. Ruspini, in 

 my quality of pharmacien, although 1 was no longer pro- 

 fessionally engaged to make investigations relative to this 

 case, I immediately began to mike experiments in order 

 to distinguish pure Wheat flour from that mixed with 

 Lolium. My method of analysis is simple, and capable 

 of being put in practice by persons unacquainted with 

 science. It consists in digesting for half an hour alcohol 

 at 35° at the ordinary temperature, with half an ounce of 

 Wheat flour ; the more pure it is the more limpid will the 

 alcohol remain ; then it will take only a more or less deep 

 Straw colour, according as the flour contains more or less 

 of the pericarp and embryo passed through the sieve, 

 owing to the carelessness or design of the miller, v The 

 alcohol will be coloured yellow by dissolving the peculiar 

 resin which the Triticum hybernum contains, and which 

 resides in the pericarp. The taste of the alcohol thus 

 coloured will not, however, be disagreeable ; it wiil even 

 be rather sweet. If, on the contrary, alcohol be digested 

 with flour mixed with the seeds of the Lolium, the spirit 

 of wine will immediately acquire a characteristic greenish 

 tint, which will gradually become deeper ; the taste of the 

 tincture will be astringent and disagreeable to the extent 

 of exciting vomiting. Evaporated to dryness in a porce- 

 lain capsule, it will give as a product a greenish-yellow 

 resin, possessing the same characters as the tincture, but 

 more powerful, and so evident as to leave no doubt as to 

 the adulteration in question. Some reflections follow 

 concerning the infamy of such a fraud, and the necessity 

 of punishing it, by publishing the names of the bakers 

 who allow it, in the public journals. In a note, the author 

 says that the arsenic used in the liming is decomposed by 

 the earth, and that the plant cannot preserve any trace of 

 it. In a second note, he announces that this year, the 

 rains having been very abundant, before the putting forth 

 of the ears, all the bad herbs, particularly the Lolium, 

 grew abundantly in the fields, rendering it necessary to 

 sift the corn with much care. — The Chemist, 



Broccoli. — There is now exhibiting in the window of 

 Messrs. Warner and Warner, Seedsmen, 28, Cornhill, 

 two heads of Chappell's New Cream Broccoli. These 

 weigh 91bs. each ; they are in good condition, and are fair 

 specimens of that variety. 



Wax. — A theory has been promulgated by the justly 

 celebrated Professor of Chemistry at Giessen, Dr. Liebig, 

 that the constituents of the food of animals, when taken 

 into the system, during the processes of digestion and nu- 

 trition, undergo a peculiar modification, the result of 

 which is the production of substances, through the agency 

 of special organs, totally different in the proportions of 

 their chemical constituents from those of the materials 

 from which they have been derived. A proof of this 

 change was pointed out by Liebig as afforded in the pro- 

 duction of wax by the honey-bee, as in the experiments 

 of Huber, recently confirmed by Gundlach, in which the 

 bees were fed only on sugar. But it was objected by many 

 distinguished chemists that there was no direct proof in 

 these experiments; as the constituents of wax might have 

 been collected by the bees before they were confined for 

 experiment, and stored up in their own bodies, or that 

 the wax might be derived from the fat of their bodies, 

 which, in the proportions of its ultimate constituents, is 

 very similar to wax. To put these objections to the test, 

 MM. Milne Edwards and Dumas jointly undertook to 

 repeat the experiments. They first ascertained by analysis 

 the quantity of fatty matter in the bodies of a given num- 

 ber of bees, and the quantity of waxy matter accidentally 

 contained in the honey with which they were fed during 

 confinement. The result of the experiments proved that 

 the quantity of wax produced in a given period by each 

 bee exceeded very nearly three times the combined amount 

 of waxy matter contained in the food, and of fat in the 



body of each bee at the commencemeniot the experiment j 

 besides a large amount of fat still contained in its body at 

 the close. These experiments most incontrovertibly 

 prove that the constituents of the wax could not have pre- 

 existed in the bodies of the bees, but that wax is a true 

 formation, the result of changes which the constituents of 

 the food undergo, through the agency of special organs, 



during the process of nutrition Annals of Natural 



History. 



CALENDAR OF OPERATIONS 



For the ensiling Week. 



I.— HOTHOUSE, CONSERVATORIES, &c. 



Some of the more free growing plants that were potted early 

 will now want another shut, and you may give them more pot- 

 room now; this is also a grood time to try the one-shift system 

 with young 1 or lately-propagated plants. Many young plants 

 nursed in pits through the spring will now be getting too high, 

 or the pits may be wanted for other purposes ; remove them to 

 the stove, and. for the first week or two, imitate the pit-culture 

 for them as far as your house will allow. Keep them more shaded 

 than the rest of the plants; Syringe them twice a day, and keep 

 them as far from the ventilators as you can. 



Conservatory.— Now that the season is so far advanced, that 

 many of the older kinds of plants often wintered in conserva- 

 tories may be removed to temporary shelters, no plant, except 

 in flower, or a fine specimen, ought to find a place in the conser- 

 vatory from this time to the end of September. As the spring 

 Heaths get out of flower, remove them to cold pits; if they are 

 young: plants, this is the best time to prune them. I have seen 



menin the best nurseries cutting off the tops of young Heaths 

 going out of flower by handfuls. As soon as the growth of 

 forced Rhododendron aiboreum is nearly finished, remove them 

 to a cool shaded place, as this and many of its hybrids are easily 

 induced to make a second growth, and consequently produce no 

 flowers next season. Keep all plants well watered, and in good 

 shapes. 



Greenhouse.— Encourage your Greenhouse plants to make a 

 rapid growth now; keep the house warmer and mora moist than 

 is generally done, and see that this moisture does not deceive 

 you in watering; many pots may look wet on the surface, and 

 yet be dry below. Train, pinch, or prune them as circumstances 

 may direct; and, above all things, keep them perfectly clean. 



Forcing-pits. — Most of the spring-forcing plants are now done 

 with in these pits. Roses will now bloom in any close house, 

 pit, Sec. There are many plants, however, that maybe more or 

 less forced for the conservatory all the summer through, espe- 

 cially thosecalled intermediate, or half-stove plants. Camellias, 

 Azaleas, and Rhododendrons that have been early forced may 

 be grafted as soon as the young wood begins to get hard. Before 

 you throw away an overstock of seedlings raised this spring, as- 

 certain whether they can be used as stocks for others of the same 

 tribes, of which you may be short. Of all modes of propagating 

 rare plants, grafting is the easiest, and require* less time and 

 attention. — D. B. 



II.— FLOWER GARDEN AND SHRUBBERIES. 



Out-dour Department. 



The importance of grouping plants in flower-gardens according 

 to their complementary colours has been so repeatedly insisted 

 upon, both in leading and other articles, since this Paper first 

 started, that it would scarcely be worth while to advert to it if it 

 were not (or the great accession of subscribers during the present 

 year. The leading principles of this system of management 

 are— contrast and symmetry. Contrast Buch as will be produced 

 by placing the complementary colours pretty close together, as 

 scarlet with white, purple with yellow, orange with blue, and so 

 on with the various shades of these colours ad infinitum', and 

 symmetry «ucn as will result from every bed having a corre- 

 sponding one in form and disposition, and these beds planted 

 with flowers of the same colour. In borders which are seen 

 throughout in the length and breadth of them, the colours 

 should be repeated at regular intervals, as scarlet, white, purple, 

 yellow, blue, orange, and so on to the end j and where beds are 

 placed on Grass, and without a corresponding one near them, 

 they should be belted with the complementary colours, a* bJue 

 with an orange margin, purple with yellow, and scarlet with 

 white; or as green is the proper contrast for scarlet, beds of that 

 colour may be left without a margin, and white, under such cir- 

 cumstances, used as a distinct bed. Where beds are on gravel, 

 which is a warm colour, cold colour should be the most used, as 

 blue, purple, and white, which for Floricultural purposes takes 

 the place of green : or if warm colours must be introduced, it is 

 indispensable that they be margiued with cold colours. In large 

 gardens where there is a great preponderance of green, as large 

 lawns or trees, extensive lakes, aud more especially if the trees are 

 sufficientlylarge to throw considerable shade upon the scenery, 

 nothing but warm colours should be used, as scarlet, orange, and 

 yellow ; and these should be planted in large masses, and stand 

 out prominently in the foreground of the scenery, and especially 

 near the water. Whoever has walked through the metropolitan 

 parks will have noticed how much more cheerful is the aspect 

 of the lake in St. James's than it is in the Regent's Park or Ken- 

 sington Gardens; and this is because the water is surrounded 

 by gravel, which gives warmth to the scenery; and were the 

 islands in the lake in the same park planted with double Furze, 

 white Broom, and the Judas-tree, instead of being studded with 

 little heaps of flints, as an apology for rock-work, and which 

 resemble so many oyster grottos, we should then have in a few 

 years one of the most splendid scenes that can well be con- 

 ceived. With these sunny days, and parching east and north- 

 east winds, it is impossible to get on with anything in the 

 Flower Garden; but Necessity's stern command compels me to 

 transplant upwards of 100 large shrubs and trees, some of them 

 from 20 to 30 feet high, and in full leaf, and strange to say, not 

 one in ten of them has indicated any check from their removal, 

 although they have now been transplanted nearly a fortnight. 

 In the Flower Garden look to Annuals, which will suffer much, 

 if not watered; ami get all in readiness to begin planting out 

 directly we get a soaking of ra ; n ; but before we get rain it 

 would be madness to think of planting anything out. 



Reserve Garden. — Watering and thinning the young plants is 

 the principal work at the present time ; but double Primroses^. 

 Polyanthuses, &C.; which are out of bloom, and being removed 

 from the Flower Garden, must he parted, and planted in rich* 

 soil in a shaded situation, and deluged with water. 



American Garden.— This is a good time to tie out or peg down 

 the branches of American plants, so that the young shoots may 

 take the right direction when they begin to grow. In high 

 and exposed situations the plants must have water, or they will 

 be unable to expand their blooms properly.— W. 1 J . A. 



111.— FLORISTS' FLOWERS. 

 If extreme hot days and frosty nights are favourable to the 

 perfect development of Florists 1 Flowers, then the last tenor 

 twelve days have been singularly propitious, for we seldom have 

 such Aprils as the past. Exhibitions of the Auricula are taking 

 place, and from most localities we hear favourable accounts; 

 and at some Shows in various parts, we have seen splendid 

 blooms of the following first-rate flowers :— Page's Champion, 

 Oliver's Lovely Ann, V\uierhou*e's Conqueror of Europe, Lee a 

 Colonel Taylor; the last of which, though not exactly to our 

 mind in some of its properties, was, nevertheless, extremely 

 fine, the pips being lar-er than usual; ami t! :ir>t-rate purple 

 Self, Barker's Nonsuch, was in excellent con on though it 

 appears scarce in collections. As we observed last week, all 

 blooming plants ought to be under awnings, in a northern 

 aspect; keep the pots free from weeds. The green fly is often 



