Jtdy 20, 1876. ] 



JOUBNAL OF HOBTICDLTUBE AND COTTAGE GABDENEB. 



57 



Zanzibar, and The Shah, and these were all good Boses and 

 which will be welcome additions to our gardens. 



Messrs. Cranston & Mayos "swept the board." They took 

 first in every class save one, and that one was (hear it and re- 

 joice, Mr. William Paul) where their grand Bose Sir Garnet 

 Wolseley was beaten by Star of Waltham. Of course, at Hereford 

 we expect to see Mr. Cranston very fine, but considering the 

 weather and the exposed situation of his nursery the stands he 

 staged were simply wonderful. For months he has had no rain, 

 and at King's Acre he has to pump every drop of water. This 

 drought succeeded the coldest spring and the longest winter he 

 has had for years. His soil is one that requires moisture more 

 than any other, and he is more dependant upon a genial season 

 than any of his great rivals, and yet he showed us blooms that 

 would lead you to suppose that everything had been in his 

 favour. It was hard to believe, as we walked over his nursery 

 and saw how dreadfully he suffered from want of rain, how the 

 Boses we had seen could have come from there ; but at the very 

 extremity of his nurseries we found an orchard which had been' 

 broken up two years ago, and there, under the shade of Apple 

 and Pear trees, the plants had done well, and given him nearly 

 all his blooms. 



But, among other surprises I had this year at Hereford, I must 

 notice the marked improvement made by Mr. Davison. He 

 showed a stand of twenty-four blooms of Fisher Holmes whioh 

 were simply perfection, and which caused the only difference of 

 opinion between myself and my brother Judge. In this class we 

 had seven stands exhibited — three of Marie Baumann, one of 

 Horace Vernet, Marochal Niel, and Alfred Colomb. The first 

 prize was won by Mr. CranBton with Horace Vernet, and the 

 second, after calling in an umpire, by Mr. Cant with Alfred 

 Colomb. I was most anxious to give the second, or at least an 

 equal second, to Fisher Holmes, but the general feeling was 

 against me, although I rejoice to say Mr. Cant (the winner) 

 assured me he thought I was right. 



_ And now for the amateurs. Messrs. Cranston & Mayos most 

 liberally offered a challenge cup value £15 15s., to be competed 

 for by amateurs. This, of course, brought a great number of 

 exhibitors. Mr. Arkwright of Hampton Court, Mr. T. Jowitt of 

 Hereford, Mr. Baker of Exeter, Bev. Charles Evans of Solihull, 

 and myself were the principal exhibitors. Mr. Baker and 

 myself had to cut our blooms twenty-four hours before Mr. 

 Jowitt and Mr. Arkwright ; we had also a ten-hours journey on 

 one of the hottest days of the year, and I had to change my 

 boxes no less than four times, and yet we ran the Hereford men 

 hard, or so we think. Mr. Jowitt won the cup, and won it well ; 

 and a first-class roBarian and a most enthusiatic exhibitor now 

 enjoys the great happiness of excelling in his second year as 

 exhibitor the giant Hercules, his powerful neighbour at Hamp- 

 ton Court, and all the rest of us. The Bev. Charles EvanB was 

 placed second, Mr. Baker was third, and they were kind enough 

 to give me an extra. 



There was very great competition in all the other stands, and 

 the prizes were won principally by Mr. Arkwright, Mr. Baker, 

 Bev. C. Evans, and myself. 



And now let us say a word or two about the hospitality of 

 Hereford, the graceful adjuncts of the lovely Show. It would 

 require the pen of a nineteenth-century Horace to tell of this. 

 Mr. Cranston entertained all the great nurserymen and the 

 principal amateurs in a manner which I wiBh that many others 

 would but imitate. It was a show and a meeting long to be 

 remembered by others besides— J. B. M. Cashi. 



WEST OP SCOTLAND KOSABIANS' SOCIETY. 



July 12th and 13th. 



While the West of England has been holding its tournament 

 in honour of the queen of flowers, at which I had been earnestly 

 requested to be present, our friends over the border had been 

 at the same time honouring her at the beautiful little town of 

 Helensburgh, situated at the entrance of the Garelock— a situ- 

 ation which may well challenge any other watering place that 

 I know, and where some moBt enthusiastic lovers of the Bose 

 have started, and will I hope be able to maintain, a flourishing 

 Exhibition. 



The Show was undoubtedly held a little too early for the 

 northern growers in such a season as this has been, and pos- 

 sibly even better blooms than those exhibited might have been 

 brought forward had the Show been later ; and as the north of 

 Ireland is apparently Bomewhat earlier the finest blooms came 

 from thence. There is one peculiarity connected with this 

 Exhibition, and that is that the Society supplies all the stands, 

 or rather supplies tables pierced with holes into which the tubes 

 are placed, and are then covered with moss. Like many inno- 

 vations it has its advantages and disadvantages. It places all 

 the exhibitors on the same level. It does away with the diffi- 

 culty that committees have of arranging the amount of room 

 required from the unequal sizes of the boxes. Some persons 

 will exhibit, say, forty-eight blooms in boxes which take up 

 twice the room of another exhibitor. The disadvantages are 



these : There is no bringing of two boxes together, as one often 

 likes to do when they run very close, in order to compare them ; 

 then when people do not bring their entries, the spaces are 

 vacant, and these have to be filled with spare blooms, which has 

 a tendency to create confusion, and which ought not, I think, 

 to be placed until after the Judges have given their decision. 



I find that not only here but all through Scotland the vicious 

 principle of showing Boses with added foliage has been adopted ; 

 but I trust that our friends there will see that this is what every 

 true lover of the Bose would desire to see abolished. Inde- 

 pendently of every other consideration, it ought to be remem- 

 bered that sometimes a dishonest exhibitor will put up two 

 blooms of the Bame Bose in his stand and give them different 

 names. It may be oftentimes very hard to distinguish them, 

 and if there is foliage added it is almost hopeless, but where they 

 are shown as cut from the Bose tree the wood will often lead to 

 an identification ; and as to the statement that they cannot get 

 such foliage as in the south, I can only say that in the evening I 

 took a Baunter through Messrs. Bobertson & Galloway's grounds, 

 and found as robust foliage as I should wish to see anywhere. 



It would hardly interest the readers of the Journal were I to 

 particularise the different stands and give the names of the 

 blooms. In truth there is very little difference. Wherever a 

 show is held the same blooms are to be Been. What stand iB 

 complete without Charles Lefebvre, Marie Baumann, La France, 

 Madame Victor Verdier, and other Boses which we all know by 

 heart ? I may say, however, that in the MeBars. Dickson's of 

 Newtonards, Co. Down, Ireland, was one of the finest blooms 

 of Mdlle. Marie Cointet that I have seen, and which gained the 

 prize as the best Bose in the nurserymen's class, and a Beedling 

 of their own called Alex. Dickson, a large, full, and peculiar- 

 looking flower in the way of Madame Schmidt, and Mons. E. Y. 

 Teas, evidently one of the best Boses of last year; and shall I 

 not add — (aye, Mr. Camm !) — Madame Lacharme, which has this 

 season been neither " as coarse as a navvy or as dirty as a 

 scullion ?" The gardeners of Major Dumistorn and Mr. Watson, 

 the President of the Society, exhibited some remarkably fine 

 blooms. I have never seen Baronne Maynard exhibited so well ; 

 and the best bloom of La France that I have seen this year was 

 in the former gentleman's stand, while the latter obtained the 

 premier prize in his class for a grand bloom of Etienne Levet. 



As in most of these cases of a successful show there is one 

 leading spirit to whom the results are in a great measure due, 

 so here it is to the indefatigable exertions of Mr. Galloway of 

 the firm of Bobertson & Galloway that the present position of 

 the West of Scotland Bosarians' Society is to be attributed. His 

 is not a provincial name merely. Many of our London friends 

 will recollect how last September he came up with a magnificent 

 Btand of Gladioli and wrested the championship from that veteran 

 and successful grower Mr. Kelway. He has worked with a will, 

 and has been ably seconded by the Directors of the Society. 

 I know of no young Society which has a better promise of 

 lengthened days, and I shall ever esteem it a happy thing that 

 I was enabled to go so far north to assist in their tournament in 

 honour of the queen of flowers. — D., Deal. 



NEW BOOK. 



Complete Manual of Orchid Culture. By Edward Spbague 

 Band, jun. Hurd & Houghton, New York. 

 Like the " Orchid Manual " by Mr. B. S. Williams, this 

 book has been prepared by an enthusiast in Orchid culture. 

 The author's experience has been gained at Glen Bidge, near 

 Boston, and the cultural directions are more intended for 

 American than English gardeners. The following advice on 

 purchasing Orchids should be noted by those intending to 

 commence their culture. " If a dealer wishes to disgust a 

 beginner with Orchid culture, let him send him a dozen plants 

 for twenty-five dollars. Put the same money into two or 

 three good plants, and the result will be a virulent attack of 

 Orchid fever." " Orchids," continues our author, " are the 

 elite of the floral kingdom ; they combine more of beauty, 

 fragrance, and singularity of structure than any other family 

 of plants, and, certain rules being observed, are generally as 

 easily grown as Boses, Pinks, and Violets." We agree with 

 the first part of this paragraph, but not the last. Orchids are 

 not aB easily grown as Boses and Violets, nor can they be 

 grown by the observance of certain rules. A grower may 

 observe certain rules at one place, and be quite successful in 

 the culture of certain species. He may observe the same rules 

 at another place and in a similarly constructed house, and 

 just be aB unsuccessful as he was formerly successful. Take 

 one or two species as illustration. A gardener grows a batch 

 of Phala3nop6is remarkably weD, the leaves and flowers even 

 surpassing those of their native wilds. In two or three years 

 these fine plants will begin to die-off or go back, until they are 

 a wreck of what they used to be ; and all the care and anxiety 



