May 11, 1912.] 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE: 



310 



Royal Gardeners- Orphan Fund. — The add considerably to their commercial value. It 

 24th annual Festival dinner of the Royal Gar- 

 deners' Orphan Fund took place on Wednesday 

 last at the Hotel Cecil. Sir Edwin Durning- 

 Lawrbnce, Bart., presided, and the company 

 numbered 124. During the proceedings, the Sec- 



is essentially a working library, a collection of 

 literary " tools." There are very few rarities in 

 the sense of first editions. In only a few in- 

 stances has Sir Joseph allowed himself to stray 

 far from the paths of science, and it is very 



the 



retary, Mr. Brian Wynne, announced that the 

 total" amount of the donations was £1,056, includ- 

 ing 100 guineas contributed by the chairman. We 

 shall publish further details in our next issue. 



Surveyors' Institution.— The next ordinary 

 general meeting of this society will be held at 

 the Institution on Monday, the 13th inst., when 

 the adjourned discussion on Mr. G. Taylor 

 Loban's paper on " Some Principles in 

 Valuation of Land and Buildings " will be con- 

 tinued. 



Madresfield Court and the Gardeners' 

 Royal Benevolent Institution.— For many 

 years the Earl of Beatjchamp has permitted his 

 gardens and pleasure grounds to be annually 

 thrown open to the public. On account of the 

 forthcoming Royal International Horticultural 

 Exhibition, in connection with which Mr. CRin 

 the gardener at Madresfield, is hon. secretary for t^' 



curious to -notice here a few exceptions, such as a 

 copy of the 1542 edition of the Workes of 

 Chaucer in black-letter type, and still more so 

 to come across a copy — wanting the title to the 

 first volume — of John Foxe's Actes and Monu- 



itog near Cape Town Vines which were planted 

 towards the end of the seventeenth century. The 

 introduction of the Vine into Australia reads like 

 a romance. In the years 1815-16, at the close of 

 the Xapoleonic campaign, a captain, John 

 MacArthur, with his two sons, journeyed on 

 foot through those parts of Europe where Vine 

 growing was a feature of the countryside. The 

 result of this tramp was bundles of Vine cuttings 

 representative of each district visited. These were 

 jubilantly taken back to the Antipodes, where 



ments of Matters, 1853, better known as the attempts were made to propagate them. To the 

 Book of Martyrs. Samuel Purchac's Pilgrim- dismay of the growers the varieties were found 



age, 1613, is also a curious book to find in a 

 purely scientific library. The books are for the 

 most part English, but a good many valuable 

 works of reference in German and French occur 

 in the collection. 



eee. In 1825, however, a 

 few Vines were imported from the R.H.S. Gar- 

 dens at Chiswick, and six years later James 

 Busby brought the first Australian wine to Eng- 

 land. This was submitted to London wine mer- 



W 



Mr. 



kind 



The fol- 



. lowing year Mr. Busby imported at his own ex- 



Walter E. Archer, C.B. who, as assistant secre- ^ ^.^ of the Vine from the ^^ 



tary, has been in charge of the Fisheries Division 



tion formed at the instigation of Napoleon at the 



of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries since Luxembo Gardens in Paris , and from Mont _ 



its establishment in October, 1903, has been com- 

 pelled to retire from the public service owing to 

 ill-health. His retirement took effect on the 1st 



county of Worcester 

 were on view at an earlier date than usual. Un- 

 fortunately, the morning was wet, but the 

 weather cleared in time to permit a goodly num- 

 ber of persons to visit the domain, and the 



Gardener's Golden Wed 



Mr. and 



Mrs. Thos. Hughes, of Llanforda Gardens, 

 Shropshire, have just celebrated their golden 

 wedding. Mr. Hughes, who has been gardener 



funds of the Gardeners' Royal Benevolent Insti- at Llanforda for nearly 39 years, was Piously 



tution will substantially benefit by the proceeds 



Bournemouth 



w . QV dm 



Biochlmical Club.— A meeting of the Bio- 

 chemical Club was held at University College, 

 Reading, on Saturday, May 4. Among the papers 



North Wales and Anglesey. 



Colonial Vine Culture.— A paper on this 

 subject was read before the Royal Society of 

 Arts on May 7 last by Mr. Alan H. Bur- 



pelier. This was before the days of the Suez 

 Canal, and after many months on the sea no 

 fewer than 362 varieties were successfully 

 rooted ; in fact, a few actually rooted en voyage, 

 and were placed on deck in open boxes and duly 

 watered. After various vicissitudes — in 1852 

 gold was discovered and labour was next to un- 

 obtainable — Vine culture extended ; in 1872 there 

 were nearly 16,000 acres devoted to Vine culture 

 in the states of New South Wales, S. Australia, 

 and Victoria, and the production of Austral: in 

 Vines is now a staple industry. 



"The Botanical Magazine." — The issue 

 for May contains illustrations and descriptions of 



Heading, on Saturday, iviay h. Among une pap^i* **.**« — - — j - -* , following nlants • 



which were read was one by Dr. Armstrong and goyne, M.P. After dealing at length with >t he ^^^^ 



Professor Keeble on the process of pigment-for- 

 mation in the flowers of plants. The communica- 



antiquity of the Vine, and the traditional origin 

 of wine-making, the lecturer remarked on the in- 



AAA m W A ^^ A a A m A V> XX *■# A-Ai ^*r • ■ "^ ^» m ^^f ^m T^" — ■* ^^ ™ a ^" •~~' » ' ~ — — ~ ■- — — — ■ — 



lion of the results of experiments made by the teresting fact that in Cyprus the process of wine- 

 authors aroused considerable interest. They de- making is just the same as it was many centuries 



monetrated that the formation of flower-pigment 



o — the 



is due to the action of oxydase on a colourless feet in any convenient spot, and the resultant 

 substance (chromogen), and that in many flowers 



two oxydases are present — one in the epidermal 

 cells and the other in the cells which run in 

 relation with the vascular bundles. Another 

 communication by Mr. Golding dealt with the 

 cause of the yellow discoloration in Stilton 

 cheese. This subject is of considerable economic 

 importance, for cheeses discoloured in this way 

 sell for a considerably lower sum than that ob- 

 tained for non-discoloured Stiltons. The author 

 brought forward evidence to show the nature of 



" must " is fermented in porous earthenware jars 

 which are coated inside and out with tar. The lec- 



Davidia involucrata var. Vilmoriniana, 

 tab. 8432. — This plant was illustrated in Gar- 

 deners' Chronicle, June 2, 1906, p. 346, fig. 138, 

 from a photograph of Mr. Yilmorin's specimen 

 at Les Barres. The plant was raised from seeds 

 sent by Pere Farges from China in 1897 ; 

 subsequently Mr. Wilson sent seeds to Messrs. 

 James Veitch & Sons, and an illustration of a 



. , flowering spray from a plant raised in the 



turer gave interesting particulars concerning the Coombe Wood Nurser ies was published in Gar- 

 output of the various brands of wine from the Le- deners' Chronicle, May 27, 1911, p. 329, fig. 149. 



Iris chrysographes, tab. 8433. — This species 

 was described by Mr. Dykes in Gardeners' 

 Chronicle, June 10, 1911, p. 362. The plant was 

 discovered by Mr. Wilson in Kuan Hsien, 

 China, at elevations of from 7,000 to 11,000 feet 

 above sea-level. The flowers are an intense 

 purple colour, sometimes marked with lines of 



vant. From Cyprus the audience were taken to 

 Canada, and high testimony was given to the fit- 

 ness of certain districts for wine-growing, instanc- 

 ing the Niagara section of Ontario, and the penin- 

 sula between Lakes Erie and St. Clair, where the 

 Vine flourishes amazingly. In 1896 it was esti- 

 mat^ that there were 2.000,000 vines growing in 



the discolour king process, and has thus made the provinces of Ontario. Cape Colony was next yellow and bands of brown. 



the first essential step toward the discovery of the dealt with ; the success which attended the efforts Saxifraga lingulata, tab. 8434,— Saxif raga 



means of preventing it. 



Theft from Kew Gardens. — A visitor to the 

 Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, has been convicted 

 and fined for stealing plants from the glass- 

 houses. Circumstances proved that this was 

 n ot a case of a person yielding to sud- 

 den temptation, for, on being searched, it 

 was discovered that the man had fastened in- 

 side his waistcoat tins of water for the purpose 

 of keeping the slips of plants fresh. A detective 

 visited the man's home, and, it is said, found 

 over 1,000 different kinds of plants packed in a 

 greenhouse, many of them being of rare species, 



which were identified as having been taken from 

 Kew. 



Sir Joseph Hookers Library.— The late 

 Sir Joseph Hooker's extensive botanical library, 



of science voyages and works on general science, 



will be sold by Messrs. Sotheby, Wilkinson & 

 Hodge, at 13, Wellington Street, Strand, on 

 the 17th inst. Several of the volumes are 

 presentation copies, many having valuable and 

 interesting manuscript notes by the late owner 

 j others ; in some instances autograph letters 

 ot the various authors are inserted, which will 



of the Dutch settlers, who introduced the Vine in 

 1653, led to the further importation of fresh cut- 

 tings. For a time the Vine culture of South 

 Africa was of a very elementary nature, but with 

 the coming of the energetic Huguenots, in 1688, a 

 sudden development upon practical lines was 

 made, and many new varieties of Grape were 

 brought from the South of France, including the 

 small Muscat type of Frontignan. In 1880 there 

 were 20,000 acres under Vines, which were 

 planted closely together, usually between 2 and 

 3 feet apart. Owing to the exceptional climatic 

 conditions the culture was, and still is, confined 

 to the western provinces. The pest known as 

 Phylloxera was discovered in Cape Colony 

 in 1886, and much loss ensued, but re- 

 planting is now taking place with Vines 

 grafted on American Phylloxera -resistant roots. 

 So little care was formerly bestowed upon 

 the Vine that in 1886 an experienced grower, 

 advocating the use of scissors or a sharp knife 

 for pruning Vines, wrote: "It is marvellous how 

 Vines can at all sustain the rough treatment of 

 a club-stick or a hatchet, with which the young 

 branches are too frequently broken off ! It is 

 interesting to learn that there are still grow- 



lingulata is a beautiful white-flowered species, a 

 native of the Italian Maritime Alps. S. lantos- 

 cana and S. australis are included by Mr. 

 Spragtje as varieties of S. lingulata, the one 

 being found on the French side of the Alps and 

 the other in Central and Southern Italy. Saxi- 

 fraga lingulata is an old garden plant and forms 

 a fine subject for planting in the rock garden. It 

 produces its beautiful inflorescences in May. 



Hypocalymma robustum, tab. 8435.— When 

 New Holland plants were, popular about half a 

 century ago, Hypocalymma robustum was com- 

 monly grown in conservatories, but it has now 

 almost dropped out of cultivation. The plant is 

 half hardv and specimens have flowered in 



the open in the late Mr. Gumbleton's garden at 



Queenstown, Ireland. The flowers are pink; 

 they are produced in the axils of the narrow 

 leaves. In West Australia the plant 2 * known 

 as the Swan River Peach Myrtle. 



Calceolaria Forgetii, tab. 8436— This plant 

 was first identified as Calceolaria virgata, and 

 was illustrated under this name in Gardeners* 

 Chronicle, January 27 last, p. 50, fig. 27, the 

 accompanying description being by Mr. W. 

 Irving. 



