106 Culture of the Mushroom. 



a change for the worse ? Compression is, for certain soils, 

 more valuable than expansion, and the effect may sometimes 

 depend on mechanical, and sometimes on chemical, or other 

 reasons. If Mr. Grisenthwaite, of Wells, has paid as much 

 attention to horticulture as he seems to have done to agricul- 

 ture, he is capable of throwing much light on this department 

 of our art ; and should he by any means see this, we invite 

 him to become a correspondent. Even the speculations of 

 such a man will be most interesting to many readers, and may 

 prove truly valuable in the end, by leading practical men 

 to study chemistry, to institute scientific experiments, and 

 to acquire habits of accurate observation. One must have 

 some favourite theory or hypothesis to establish or support as 

 a motive to begin with, otherwise experiment would not be 

 pursued with sufficient enthusiasm. Whatever becomes of 

 the hypothesis, the facts remain, and are so much in addition 

 to the previous stock of knowledge. — Cond. 



Art. VIII. On the Culture of the Mushroom in Hot-house 

 Sheds. By Mr. Thomas Forrest, C.M.H.S. Gardener 

 to W. L. Hughes, Esq. M. P., at Kinmel Park, near 

 Abergeley, Denbighshire. 



Behind the hot-houses here I have sheds, and along the 

 back wall I grow the mushroom with very great success. AH 

 practical gardeners are well aware of the rapid decay of 

 wooden shelves used for that purpose, owing to the very great 

 steam that arises from the dung of a mushroom bed. I there- 

 fore build along the back wall of the shed, r a thin wall of 

 brick, four feet distant from it, which will make a bed four 

 feet wide, and about eighteen inches or two feet high in front, 

 and will afford plenty of mushrooms. [Cast-iron shelves are 

 found to answer extremely well ; one at the Earl of Gros- 

 venor's, Eaton Hall, has given every satisfaction.] My mode 

 of filling the brick beds is as follows : I lay on the bottom six 

 inches of faggots, or any old wood that may be of little use, 

 in case the dung be wet (for we are not able at all times to 

 have things as they ought to be), to drain off any improper 

 moisture that might be in the dung ; I then fill the bed, within 

 three inches of the top, with old linings of hot-beds, not too 

 much exhausted ; beating it down, at the same time, as firm 

 as possible. I then take and lay on the top four or five inches 

 of good horse-droppings, beating it well down also. The bed 



