Domestic Notices. — England. 351 



Art. II. — Domestic Notices. 



ENGLAND. 



American Aloe in the open Garden. — About eight years back I pulled 

 down one of my hot-houses, in which stood a large American aloe (Agave 

 Americana) known to be sixty-eight years of age. It was in a box about 

 two feet square, and the plant was so large that I determined not to put it 

 into the new house then building : it was in consequence placed alongside 

 the south wall in a corner (not expecting it to live), where it has been ever 

 since, never having been watered in summer, nor matted nor attended to 

 in winter, and it is now as vigorous and as healthy (if not more so) than 

 before. The box was not buried in the ground, and is now falling to 

 pieces. The garden is about 100 yards from the sea. — (Lloyd H. Banford 

 Hesketh, Giorych Castle, Abergeley, Denbighshire.) 



We shall be happy to know the dimensions of this plant, and also whe- 

 ther any, and what other exotics have been tried in the open air in this 

 seemingly most favourable climate and situation. Oranges and lemons 

 would probably succeed as well as they do in some parts of Devonshire ; 

 the Loquat (p. 254.) would have a magnificent effect ; and there can be 

 little doubt many of the Australasian plants (p. 336.) would succeed, and 

 many also from China and the Cape. Of all horticultural amusements, we 

 know few so interesting as that of attempting to acclimate, or more cor- 

 rectly, trying the degree of hardiness, of fine foreign plants. — Cond. 



Subterraneous Irrigation of a Vine-Border. — Mr. Wetton, of Style- 

 House, near Kew Bridge, a zealous amateur of horticulture, is now erecting 

 a pine and grape-house, with the border of which he has taken more than 

 usual pains. This border is partly without the house in front, and extends 

 also within it under the pine-pit to the back wall. The tan of this pit 

 will rest on flag-stones, supported "by brick piers, by which means a stra- 

 tum of air will intervene between the hot tan and the soil containing the 

 roots of the grapes. This bed of soil is about three feet deep, and, in order 

 to have the full command of watering it, either with pure water or liquid 

 manure, a cast-iron pipe, four inches in diameter, is conducted along the 

 bed in the middle of the mass of earth. This pipe is perforated with a row 

 of holes on each side ; and into these holes are inserted iron tubes of half 

 an inch in diameter, and of different lengths, from one foot to four feet, so as 

 that their orifices may deliver the water regularly through the whole mass of 

 earth. Both ends of the main pipe terminate in funnels outside of the 

 house, and four or five feet above the surface ; by which means, when water 

 is supplied by them, there will be a pressure equal to the height of the 

 column between the horizontal pipe and the summit of the funnel ; which 

 pressure will clear out the small delivery tubes, should they be at any time 

 partially choked up by worms or sediment. 



However ingenious this plan may be, we consider it, as we told its worthy 

 inventor, as possessing no advantages whatever ; for, by leaving vacuities 

 from the stratum of air over the bed of soil into the paths of the house, 

 or rather, by having the pit standing, like a large box, upon brick piers, 

 which may be effected by commencing the brick walls on the pavement 

 constituting the bottom of the pit, water could have been poured in every 

 whereat pleasure. As to its not sinking equally on a surface liable to be- 

 come dry, hard, and dusty, that evil is readily obviated, by covering with 

 six inches of clean round gravel. Mr. Wetton intends planting vines 

 against the back wall of this house, and the bed under the pit will certainly 



