September 31, 18?6. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND OOTTAtiS GARDENER. 



261 



Tamer's collections, whereas they were exhibited by Mr. G. 

 Smith, and a vote of thank3 given for them. 



THE DROUGHT- ITS LESSONS. 



Tue degree of hardiness of any plant can only correctly be 

 ascertained when it is in fall health and when it grows in a 

 soil and situation to which its nature is suited. Insufficient 

 knowledge of these is the cauBe of the conflicting statements 

 which are published respecting the same plant in isothermal 

 sections. 



The effects of drought are frequently mistaken for those of 

 cold. Deprived of moisture a plant is deprived of food, and thus 

 half starved ; though lingering through the summer it succumbs 

 to the severity of winter. Excessive richness as well as exces- 

 sive poverty of soil may cause the death of plants during winter 

 by inducing a superabundant exhaustive growth which they 

 can neither mature nor support. 



But we have trees and shrubs, herbaceous plants and annuals, 

 that are adapted to -every variety of soil and condition of 

 weather, and it is a knowledge of such adaptation that enables 

 eorne, let the season be what it may, to preserve their garderjs 

 in comparative beauty. 



The present summer, the hottest and driest we have ever 

 experienced, has wrought great mischief in those grounds 

 wherein such relations have been entirely ignored, and only 

 (hose who presume to believe that a liberal and prompt expen- 

 diture of money can be made fully as effectual in the repara- 

 tion of damages as horticultural observation and study, will 

 fail to bo instructed by its lessons. 



It is true the present season has been exceptional and severe 

 droughts local, but it is just these exceptional seasons that we 

 should provide against in the selection and distribution of our 

 EO-called hardy plants. Let extremes of heat or cold, wet or 

 drought, occur but once in ten years, it suffices to kill or sadly 

 disfigure the beautiful forms of many trees and shrubs that 

 under our care have grown to full maturity, and that constitute, 

 it may be, those very objects of our grounds to which we have 

 become most attached. In many affairs of life we may be 

 guided by rufes— in this phase of horticulture we should be 

 guided by exceptions. 



While now we see plants green and vigorous growing in 

 sandy soils or high dry situations, whether in private grounds, 

 in woods, or fields, we may safely conclude that the eame 

 varieties are as well adapted to the highest driest parts of 

 our own grounds, and that after cultivating them for yeara 

 they will not in their mature beauty be destroyed by drought, 

 either directly or by being so weakened as not to be able to 

 endure the cold of the ensuing winter. So likewise, when we 

 eee plants suffering in such situations, we may be sure that 

 they are not adapted to each other in any other locality. This 

 is but one of tho lessons of the drought ; but it is well worth 

 the learning, and requires but little inconvenience or effort. 



To apply theBO remarks to floriculture, we have found that 

 many plants that it has been deemed necessary to water daily 

 during the dry hot weather of other summers, have fared just 

 as well during the present drought without being watered at all. 

 Wo may point out especially Plumbago capensis, that though 

 placed in the upper tier of a rookwork exposed to the sun 

 nearly all day and never watered, has bloomed more profusely 

 than ever before, while the foliage is perfectly green and 

 healthy. Had we watered this plant as in previous seasons, 

 the impression could not be avoided that its preservation was 

 due to the water and not to any special adaptation of the 

 plant to the driest of situations. Thus we are enabled to add 

 one of the most charming of plants to the soanty list of those 

 which are perfectly adapted to rockeries. 



The Eucalyptus globulus, seeds of which were sown last 

 December 3rd, is now 3 feet high and of about the same 

 breadth, with widely-spreading branches, and opposito, nearly 

 sessile leaves that, in those two respects, recall the Honey- 

 suckle. Though this has received no water, there is not one 

 discoloured leaf upon our several specimens, and the glaucous 

 bloom that covers the young wood and leaves gives it a most 

 refreshing appearance. The new Bhoots are furrowed and 

 sharply four-angled. These furrows and angles gradually dis- 

 appear until the ripened wood is as smooth and round as a 

 ring. The bluish-green bloom of the new shoots is readily 

 rubbed off with the hand, and should it be moistened with 

 perspiration, it instantly presents the appearance of being 

 Buffered in blood. No insect has disturbed our plants, and we 

 should think that the Eucalyptus globulus, cut back from year 



to year, would become a favourite among tender subtropical 

 plants, particularly where the plot is located in a dry situation. 



As enduring drought remarkably well, though worthy of 

 general cultivation for other reaEons, we call attention to 

 Plumbago Larpenta?. This is an old hardy half-herbaceous 

 shrub, which is as distinct from P. capensis as two plants of 

 the same genus can be. Its habit is compact, leaves small, 

 spathulate, and flowers of a deep violet in dense heads. The 

 flowers are the size of the Verbena and, like them, salver- 

 sbaped. There is but one thing that mars its beauty — viz., 

 the flowers do not open simultaneously, and they persist after 

 their beauty has faded and form no very bright eurroundiog 

 to those blooming after. Its hardiness, compactness, en- 

 durance of drought, and possession of a colour with which our 

 gardens are never surfeited, are, however, characteristics that 

 may commend its use to all, if not for the showiest of our 

 borders, at least for those parts most liable to suffer from 

 drought. 



Among Vines less commonly cultivated that thrive in dry 

 places is the Mountain Fringe, Adlumia cirrhosa. The leaflets 

 of this Vine are peculiar, bearing no petiolular attachment 

 and being every one of a different shape. Common in our 

 western woods, where it is found mostly in wet places, a dry 

 position iB the last thought of. It is a biennial, acd its growth 

 the first season bears no resemblance to a Vine, but rather to 

 a Fern, having thrice-pinnate leaves and variously lobed littlo 

 leaflets. Beside Plumbago capensis in the rockery it flourishes 

 finely. 



All of U3 know of the Matrimony Vine (Lycinm vulgare or 

 barbarum), and many readers will exclaim, " We know enough 

 of it!" It should, indeed, be excluded from companionship 

 with all other plants on account of its spreading roots, which 

 take possession of the ground and throw up suckers for an un- 

 warrantable distance. But it is a gem in its place. Planted 

 under the eaves of houses, at the base of old stumpB and rocks, 

 upon sandy banks, or in those out-of-the-way corners which 

 it is desirable to fill with verdure that will require little or no 

 care — nothing is better. A single specimen of this shrub, for 

 it is not a Vine, grows in our own grounds close to a brick 

 foundation, entirely exposed to the sun from morning till 

 night, without having recoived one drop of water for three 

 months or more. It is cut back every spring, so that with the 

 busby form thus forced — the drooping branches and its con- 

 trast of small and large leaves — so entirely is it the right plant 

 in the right place, that from despising it as it was once grown 

 among other things, we now prize the Matrimony Vine as all 

 of ub finally prize plants that fully respond to all that is asked 

 of them. 



A sickly plant, however rare or costly, is far from ornamen- 

 tal, and grounds which are planted without regard to adapta- 

 tion of soil and situation will fail to realise the expectations 

 of the moBt tasteful arrangement. 



Taste alone may correctly point out where trees and Bhrubs 

 Bhould be planted, either as single specimens or in groups ; 

 where the flower borders and beds should be located ; where 

 the lawn should be unbroken in its velvety green ; where vistas 

 should exist to lend the charm of mystery and picturesqueness 

 to all. But a knowledge of the conditions under which plants 

 alone can mature their fulness of beauty is indispensable to 

 the development and permanence of the deBign. 



A part of this maybe learned by an observance of the effeots 

 of droughts. — (Rural New Yorker.) 



PRESERVATION OP WOODWORK. 



All country residents, and especially gardeners and farmers, 

 have to expose woodwork in some form to alternate Btates of 

 wetness and dryness. To preserve it as long a3 possible is of 

 importance, and many processes have been recommended. 

 We knew the posts of two field gates inserted at the same 

 time. The ends of two were charred before being buried, the 

 ends of the other two were tarred. The charred posts were 

 still firm for years after the others had been renewed. 



The English Mechanic states that in a paper communi- 

 cated to a meeting of engineers of the " Verein Deutscher 

 Eisenbahnverwaltungen," M. Fiiuk furnishes some data on 

 the subject, which are of considerable practical interest. 



"According to observations which were made partly on the 

 Cologne-Minden line and partly on the Hanoverian State rail- 

 ways, pine sleepers impregnated with chloride of zinc required, 

 after twenty-one years' use, an exchange to the extent of 31 per 

 cent. ; beech sleepers impregnated with creosote, after twenty- 



