570 Garden Calls : • — Selwood Parkf 



The defective point of Ascot Place is the kitchen-garden, which is over- 

 shaded and oversheltered by high trees, and ought either to be removed, 

 and its place occupied by a flower-garden, agreeably to the natural system, 

 or renovated. The shrubbery and woods, in general, require thinning, and 

 such new sorts introduced as will bring the place forward, in point of bo- 

 tany and gardening, to others of the same rank. 



Selwood Park ; Michie Forbes, Esq. Aug. 4. — The house, which we 

 only saw at a distance, appears an elegant structure. The kitchen-garden 

 is remarkable for a very large Hamburg vine, which covers more space than 

 that of Hampton Court, and bears well, considering that it is only twelve 

 or thirteen years of age. It will not, however, continue to bear well long, 

 unless the ground in front ceases to be cultivated and cropped. Instead 

 of this, it should merely have an occasional layer of i-otten dung or leaves, 

 and be forked over annually not more than 5 in. deep. If reservoirs of 

 liquid manure could be supplied, the quantity and size of the fruit would 

 be increased. In the garden we found the Ironmonger gooseberry, which is 

 superior to the Warrington, and is indeed decidedly the best variety of red 

 gooseberry. Cummings, the gardener here, is a most industrious and skil- 

 ful young man, and has his charge in remarkably good order, considering an 

 apparent want of sufficient assistance. We have sent him Vol. I. of our 

 Magazine of Natural History as a mark of our approbation, and we expect 

 from him the account of his vine, which he promised. 



Bagshot Park ; the Duke of Gloucester. Aug. 5. — The flower-garden 

 here is in as complete order as it was when we first viewed it in May, 1828 

 (Vol. IV. p- 433.). The trees in the arboretum are growing rapidly, and 

 already require to be thinned out ; in short, the whole garden will soon 

 be overgrown. The rosarj' has flowered remarkably well this season, and 

 the herbaceous garden is now in a high state of beauty. We hope, after 

 we have pubHshed certain designs for laying out flower-gardens according 

 to the natural system, which we are now preparing, the Duchess of Glou- 

 cester will authorise Mr. Toward to remodel it according to that system. 

 The scene which struck us with most force during this visit vv'as the Americaii 

 ground,inwhich the tufted masses of peat-earth shrubs, magnolias, rhododen- 

 drons, andromedas, azaleas, kalmias, ericas, &c. looked admirably. As minor 

 subjects of interest we noticed the following: — Amaryllis purpurea, now The- 

 lota purpurea, flowers all the season. The large plants of Hydrangea, in the 

 common loam of the place, always come with blue flowers ; but small cuttings 

 taken from the same plants in June, after the flower buds are formed, and 

 rooted and the flowers expanded in July and August in pots of the smallest 

 size, invariably have the flowers red. It would thus appear necessary that 

 the sap should circulate through the roots, or through the whole of a large 

 plant, before it partakes of the quality which renders it blue. In the green- 

 house is a large Fuchsi« coccinea, covered all the season with such an abun- 

 dance of berries, that tarts might be made of them if they were considered 

 eatable. These berries drop and produce good plants the same season ; 

 from which it would appear that the Fuchsia might be treated as a half- 

 hardy annual, and raised from seed every spring in hot-beds along with 

 Marigolds and China asters, and transplanted in the borders. The same 

 thing might be done with Pelargonium seeds; but it is doubtless a much 

 better thing to raise abundance of Pelargoniums early every spring from 

 cuttings, and distribute .them through the borders in May. Mr. Toward 

 turns out of the pots all his Pelargoniums, when they have done flowering, 

 into beds in the open ground ; in a week or tv/o afterwards, when they have 

 struck root, he cuts them down, or very close in : they push vigorously, 

 and in autumn he repots them. Pipings taken from the grass of forced 

 pinks, when they have done flowering early, having been planted out in 

 beds where they had struck root, were now beginning to push up flower- 



