Retrospective Criticism. 221 



cultivator to procure annually a great supply of long and strong wood, sufficiently large to make 

 basket rods, and from these he expects his crop." Mr. Newington ought to be aware that there 

 is no gardener who does not know that the system is erroneous and unnatural ; and he also knows 

 that this statement of his is ungenerous and untrue. What ! with the directions of a Miller, a 

 Smyth, a Nicol, a Knight, a Hayward, a Macphail, a Harrison, with the numerous publications 

 in our day? Indeed, if he is right, you, Sir, must have had many numskull readers, or else 

 you would have told them better before this. What will the braw lads of Scotia say, when 

 they are told that a brother has discovered, in the year 1829, that they all prune their trees in 

 order to produce, and expect their crop of peaches from basket rods ? I think they will tell 

 him that for at least 100 years a very different method has been pursued. His observations 

 on the peach trees in Malta and America cannot apply to the British gardeners' practice in their 

 culture in the open air of Britain. Standard trees in hot-houses and trees in pots are those only 

 that will bear any resemblance to the trees he has mentioned ; so that here " the British gar. 

 deners' practice " will not be so soon contemned as he imagines. Mr. Newington considers 

 Mr. Harrison's a " bad system of pruning," but the frequent production of good crops of fine- 

 flavoured fruit, with the healthful vigorous state of the trees at Wortley, has been so well 

 attested, that Mr. Harrison's method is considered of great excellence. Mr. Newington 's method 

 of " shortening back to a few eyes a considerable number of joung spray" (or summer shoots) in 

 summer, would be ruinous to peach trees; for if the trees are well established, it takes a whole 

 summer to swell off and ripen their shoots in the open air of Britain. The " long and strong" 

 shoots Mr. Newington speaks of, are the only ones that will bear his mode of treatment ; but as 

 the peach tree bears transplanting so well, a few careful transplantings will reduce them to a 

 regular degree of growth. I presume that he has not seen all the newly invented materials 

 for Jhe protection of fruit tree blossoms, or else he would not give preference to old fishing-nets. 

 Mr. Newington is quite right in disapproving of the bad method of cropping fruit tree borders 

 with " gross vegetables ; " but he is equally wrong in recommending mignonette, or any thing 

 else that makes a compact surface to the border. There should be at all times a circulation of air 

 on every part of the border, which should never be cropped within one yard of the wall. If Mr. 

 Newington's trees are planted in the kitchen-garden, and the borders managed and cropped as 

 under, other things being the same, the trees will remain healthful and vigorous a long time. In 

 November, when the leaves are all fallen, unnail the trees, leaving nails sufficient to hold the 

 shoots fast to the wall. Stretch a line lengthways 1 yard from the wall, and with a fork throw 

 the soil up carefully into a ridge, and so proceed till all is done, which, if the border is 12 ft. broad, 

 makes four ridges. Having saved in a dry place a quantity of the droppings of pigeons, hens, &c, 

 proceed to throw it on with the hand, on the surface of the border. This, by being applied 

 annually (the border being well drained, and on a good subsoil), will keep the soil in good heart 

 without any other manure. In February level down the ridge next the wall, and place a trellis 

 18 in. wide, formed of rough spars 3 in. wide, nailed on cross pieces of wood ; the inner edge of 

 the trellis 18 in. from the wail, which will keep all plants sown on the border 1 yard from the 

 wall. It has been a common practice to prick out in autumn, at the foot of the wall, lettuce, 

 cauliflower, &c, but these can be better protected under hand-glasses, which are mostly standing 

 idle at this season of the year ; neither is this a good place for them to be matured in spring, as 

 the soil becomes so soddened during winter as to prevent the roots penetrating for sufficient food. 

 Cast-iron trellises have a neat appearance, but any rough wood will answer. The proprietor of 

 the garden can walk and examine his fruit at all times, and the gardener can do the necessary 

 work ; and as the soil is loose under, it receives moisture with more certainty. At a proper time 

 the border may be levelled, and the following vegetables sown in drills, keeping the soil frequently 

 stirred between the rows, viz. onions, garlic, shallots, radish, lettuces, endives, rampion, spinach, 

 &c. These vegetables must be all removed by the first of November. The greatest evils 

 gardeners have to contend with, are the first three enemies Mr. Newington has mentioned. If 

 he can remove these, he will confer a lasting benefit on gardeners. I remain, Sir, &c. — James 

 Housman, Gardener. Toft, near Knutsford, Cheshire, Feb. 12. 1830. 



Defect in the Ripening of Grapes. — Sir, Your correspondent, Mr. Archibald, 

 has described a defect that took place in his vineries, some years ago, when the grapes were 

 approaching a state of maturity ; and Mr. Judd has also given the subject his consideration. It 

 is of the utmost importance to the grape-grower to ascertain the real cause of this very prevailing 

 disease, that he may guard against every circumstance having the least, tendency towards so fatal 

 a result. 



Mr. Archibald attributes its origin to a deficiency of fibres; Mr. Judd to an over-moist atmo- 

 sphere, and the palliative he recommends is, a more early and regular admission of air, previously 

 to the atmosphere of the interior of the house being too much heated ; or, as he considers, 

 before the cuticle of the berries is scalded. But I think Mr. Bobert Fletcher's system of cul- 

 tivation gives this opinion the negative as he is by no means particular in the admission of air 

 (Vol. I. 254.), and the superior grapes he produces are convincing proofs that nothing is radically 

 bad in his practice. There may be more than a plausible pretext for the doctrine of Mr. Judd. The 

 opinion of so distinguished a cultivator deserves its merited portion of attention and respect ; 

 vet, with all deference to that gentleman, I cannot admit the justness of his reasoning. My own 

 "opinion, grounded on experience, coincides with Mr. Archibald's view of the subject, considering 

 the fundamental defect to lie in the radlculce. When the efficient members are diseased, it is a 

 natural consequence for the subordinate parts to suffer ; and every possible precaution ought to be 

 used in guarding against circumstances which may have the least possible tendency in producing 

 a disorder in that part by which the vegetable world is nourished and supported, viz. the root. 

 But here I cannot exonerate my practical brethren from blame; for they have long pursued a 

 system which, certainly, is now partially, but ought to be universally, abjured and repudiated by 

 every gardener alive to the improvements in his profession : that is, the cropping of borders, par- 

 ticularly that of the 'vine, with vegetables, thereby depriving the roots of the primary occu- 

 pant of the due action and influence of the- sun's rays. From its advantages over the other parts 

 of the garden in accelerating esculent productions, every advantage is taken of the vine border, 

 never calculating the injurious effects such a system is sure to produce : but to the observing 

 cultivator and scientific physiologist, this practice will at once appear fraught with the most 

 dangerous consequences to the vinous production from the border. In my humble opinion it 

 frequently is the anterior cause from which originate many defects in the vinery. But one fact 

 is worth a volume of theoretical speculations, and I am furnished with one in point. A friend of 

 mine, who has the management of extensive gardens, for several years suffered less or more in his 

 crops of grapes in the same manner as described by Messrs. Judd and Archibald. I happened to 

 visit him in the beginning of June 1816, when his grapes had suffered to a very great extent. On 



