General Notices. 



305 



with your finger, for about half a minute; then take up your plants or 

 leaves, and be careful not to disturb their order, and place them on the book 

 or paper (which should be previously clamped), on which you mean to 

 have the impression : cover them with a piece of blotting-paper, and rub it 

 with your finger for a short time, then take off the plants or leaves, and 

 you will have an impression superior to the finest engraving. The same 

 piece of black paper will serve to take off a great number of impressions, 

 so that, when you have once gone through the process of blacking it, 

 you may make several impressions in a very short time. The principal 

 excellence of this method is, that the paper receives the impression of the 

 most minute veins and hairs ; you may thus also obtain the general character 

 of most flowers in a way much superior to any engraving. The impres- 

 sions may afterwards be coloured according to nature. A soft, fine, wove 

 paper, on which to take the impressions, and which should be previously 

 damped, makes them much more fine and beautiful. The above receipt was 

 sent me by a friend some years ago, but I have subsequently seen nearly 

 the same in the Philosophical Recreations. I send you a few impressions, 

 and remain, Sir, &c — T Baynton. Heanor, July 14.. 1829. 



The impressions, which are of currant leaves, ground ivy, and dandelion, 

 are remarkably distinct. — Cond. 



Draiving from Nature. — Young gardeners may accustom themselves to 

 dTaw from nature, by coating the surface of a pane of glass with a solution 

 of gum arabic, and letting it become dry. They 

 may then with one hand hold the pane between 

 their eye and the objects to be copied, and with 

 a nail in the other trace the outline of the object 

 on the gummed surface. Glass prepared in this 

 way with gum, gelatine, or bone glue, has of late 

 years been procured by English artists from France. 

 (Gill's Tech. Rep., vi. new ser. p. 226.) 



MacdougaVs inverted Garden Syringe (fig- 58.) 

 promises to be a very useful instrument for wash- 

 ing the under sides of the leaves of plants and 

 shrubs, and especially trees trained against trel- 

 lises in houses. As it may be changed at pleasure 

 to a common or straight syringe on the same prin- 

 ciple as Reid's, it may be said to cost no more 

 than the common instrument. The different parts 

 of this syringe, in addition to the cylinder or com- 

 mon syringe tube (/), are, a bent tube (a) which 

 screws into the extremity of the straight tube; a 

 convex rose for spreading the water, and which 

 screws on either to the bent tube or the straight 

 tube (e); straight roses drilled with large and with 

 small holes (d d) ; a flap valve (c) which may be 

 made of either leather or metal, and beneath which 

 there is a wire grating to exclude impurities when 

 the water is drawn in by the large opening in the 

 centre of each kind of rose (A), — a subsequent 

 improvement by Mr. Macdougal ; a hollow screw 

 for keeping in the valve and netting (g), and a 

 punch (h) which is sent along with the syringe, and 

 by which every gardener may punch out his own 

 leather valves. The price and places of sale may 

 be seen in our advertising sheet, but every gar- 

 dener knows that he may order this and every 

 other article through his seedsman, whoever he may be, without farther 

 trouble. — Cond. 



Vol. VI. —No. 26. x 



