Horticultural Memorandum Book. 319 



Art. XXV. Description and Use of a Horticultural Memo- 

 randum Booh. By a Country Clergyman. 



Sir, 



In reading your Magazine, and other horticultural works, 

 I have found great benefit from the adoption of a plan, which 

 I venture to recommend to the notice of others, through the 

 medium of your useful publication. 



It frequently happens, and particularly at this season of the 

 year (January), that the account of some process, or of some 

 experiment, strikes you as worthy of being put into practice, 

 but the time for so doing is not yet arrived : the consequence 

 too often is, that either the matter is entirely forgotten, or else 

 it is jotted down amidst a heap of other memoranda, and 

 probably escapes observation at the required season. 



To obviate these difficulties, I have provided myself with a 

 memorandum book, in which I have appropriated a certain 

 number of pages to each month in the year; and by a con- 

 trivance similar to that used in the indexes of ledgers, I am 

 able at once to turn to any particular month. The two first 

 pages of all these twelve divisions are each of them divided 

 by a line into two parts, by which means I can arrange the 

 work to be done into separate weeks, and the remainder of 

 every monthly portion is left for miscellaneous entries. 



As an instance of the manner of carrying this plan into 

 effect, I refer you to Mr. Borrowdale's article (p. 35.) on 

 growing figs in pots. Supposing this an experiment which I 

 wished to try, I should first turn in my memorandum book to 

 March, and in the portion assigned for the second week in 

 that month I should write, " Figs in pots (cuttings), L. G. M. 

 ii. 35. ;" and then, in like manner, make the proper entries in 

 the first weeks of January and June respectively; adopting 

 such a system of abbreviation as I can well understand. By 

 thus noting down every particular which occurs to you in your 

 general reading in its proper place, and referring to the work 

 in which the full description of the process is given, you are 

 sure to be reminded at the right season of what ought to be 

 done, and directed at the same time where to seek the proper 

 information. 



From the simplicity of this plan, it very probably has been 

 already adopted by others ; but as I have mentioned it to 

 several amateurs like myself, who had never heard of it before, 

 but who, at the same time, approved much of it, I am in- 

 duced to send it to you, hoping that by being published in the 



