416 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENE3. 



Jane 9, 1863. 



only, the tiles having previously been steeped in water to make 

 them adhere to the mortar, and this only cost some 35*. or 37s., 

 I forget whioh, for furnace, flue, chimney, and everything. This 

 flue heated a house 18 feet by 11, and worked satisfactorily. 

 Amateurs mostly covet such simple contrivances ; their enthu- 

 siasm often helping them over troubles, and they make as little 

 to do about many attentions as we gardeners make much. Their 

 aim is to suit their ideas to their pocket, and ours is to suit our 

 master's pocket to our craft. An amateur measures his pocket ; 

 he has £20, £30, or £50, that he can spend on a hobby, he is fond 

 of flowers, takes a fancy to an orchard-house, likes to grow his 

 own Grapes, and considers how he can do this or that for the 

 least money. If he can build a house for £20, and heat it for 

 less money than a gardener, or if he can plan so as to have a 

 house twice the size of his neighbour's for the same money, 

 securing the same or better advantages, why should he not have 

 them ? By all means, I reply, have your wish, but still to 

 argue that your plan would suit Mr. So-and-So's gardener is 

 absurd. Mr. So-and-So, perhaps, objects to your plan, he doeB 

 not care for a few pounds if he can secure increased gratification, 

 nor grudge a few shillings if he is able to say — " My plants are 

 as good as those of anybody else, and a little better." There is no 

 parallel whatever between an amateur and a gardener, for with 

 one it is a question of obtaining the most for the money, whereas 

 it may be the same with the other, but oftener, " I want the 

 best house that can be had, at least,! shall expect to have things 

 grown up to the mark, for £50, £100, or £1000," and for a 

 gardener to begin patching up a house after this notice would 

 be as bad as making a halter to hang himself. 



I have seen an amateur, a clergyman, with his miniature 

 greenhouse heated by a small stove costing but 25s. On in- 

 quiring the reason for having so paltry an affair, when he could 

 afford a better, he was pleased to reply, " You know I am no 

 gardener. I will just feel my way with this small house, and 

 when I understand how to manage it, I will (D.V.) have a 

 larger." 



" Many clever people, let me tell you," continued his re- 

 verence, " go too fast ; they begin running up hills, and are 

 blown ere they reach the summit. Had I put up a house 50 feet 

 long, stocked it with fine plants, and had one of your grand hot- 

 water apparatuses, I should have wasted more money than I 

 could spare, by killing plants for want of knowing how to grow 

 them, and taken up more time than my parochial duties will 

 allow." 



" But your house, although small, is well built, the squares of 

 glass large, and provision made to admit abundance of air. 

 Why not have a good heating apparatus ? " " There you are 

 beat," replied the rev. gentleman. " I will tell you. When I 

 understand this tiny thing I may put up a vinery, and then this 

 house will make a two-light Cucumber-house, and a four-light 

 Melon-house, by putting up a partition. I shall then have a 

 boiler to heat the whole ; but if I were to have a boiler for this 

 small house, or even a flue, it would be a waste of money. I 

 had the stove by me worth 25s., and so suited my miucl to my 

 means." I was mute. 



" Could you tell me of a good boiler," resumed lie, " one that 

 will not consume too much fuel ? I thought of having a flue, 

 but flues are nasty-looking things, filling up a good deal of 

 space, requiring an annual coat of whitewash, and very often are 

 leaky after all. There are too many jointB in flues for my 

 fancy, and the smoke they emit is not very pleasant when the 

 wind blows it into the drawing-room, and covers newly- 

 washed clothes with Bmuts ; besides a flue will not consume coke 

 without attendance every two or three hours, nor cinders from 

 the house, and keep in all night without some small coal mixed 

 with them. A good boiler of small size that will do for hours 

 without attendance, and burn anything, is a desideratum, espe- 

 cially for us amateurs who are as fond of having a good produce 

 as most folk." 



This homely conversation ended in my suggesting a plan of 

 my own, as there was no boiler likely to suit him. He had a 

 good boiler behind Mb kitchen fire, and to have the " grate bars 

 cast hollow," would double the heating power. At one side 

 of the fire place was the oven, and on that side the boiler was 

 to be pierced for the pipe conveying water from the grate bars, 

 and the return-pipe might enter the grate bars on the other 

 side where it would be cast square, but hollow. He was a 

 good mechanic, and could turn his hand to anything, so 

 the making of a model was a pastime. The bars were to be 

 Ji inch, -j-inch hollow, four bars at bottom, 5 inches in depth, 



and 1 foot 6 inches long ; to be cast at any iron foundry 

 for £2, finding own model, and fixed for £l more. This was 

 calculated to heat 250 feet of four-inch pipe, and do the cooking 

 business besides, and give hot water for household purposes into 

 the bargain. 



By this simple contrivance the well-paid artizan could have 

 his greenhouse, vinery, or whatever he pleased without a costly, 

 because separate, heating apparatus. A shopkeeper in the 

 murkiest thoroughfare of London might take the slates off an 

 attic, replace with glass duchesses, cover the floor with some 

 waterproof material, convey an inch-pipe, lead or iron, from the 

 kitchen boiler below, take it through the ceiling like a gas-pipe, 

 or in the chimney, bring a return down alongside it, and then 

 connect it to as many feet of three or four-inch piping, reckoning 

 one superficial foot at a temperature of 212° to heat 50 cubic 

 feet of space to a temperature of 60°. He might have his 

 Limatodes rosea and Lycaste Skinneri in this attic-house, 

 Ferns if he chose, Roses when he pleased, Violets all the winter, 

 and his " better half" a few hours of delightful recreation daily, 

 without spending more in a year by going to Sydenham, or 

 in 10s. 6d. bouquets at Covent Garden, than would give at home 

 what is sought abroad. Anybody can make a boiler after this 

 model for themselves ; but any of the trade patenting it will be 

 prosecuted with all the rigour of the instructions my reverend 

 benefactor gave. 



It may be as well to Bay that I left that part of the country 

 shortly after, and the clergyman was soon after preferred, so 

 that 1 am inclined to think the suggestion would not be carried 

 out. But it is there, and if I ever can manage to find time to 

 make a model, and have it cast, I will do so, if it be for nothing 

 but to prove whether water will not heat as soon in an hori- 

 zontal as in an upright tube, which I have proved over and over 

 again from the fact, that a horizontal tube will make as much 

 steam in as little time as an upright. — G-. A. 

 {To he continued.) 



A DAISY-EKADICATOK. 



With reference to your remarks to 

 correspondents on the 2nd inst. under 

 the head " Destroying Daisies on a 

 Lawn," you give but little hope of ex- 

 terminating these pests. 



Having succeeded in utterly eradica- 

 ting every one on a lawn of half an 

 acre, allow me tell you how I accom- 

 plished the task. 



With the assistance of a common 

 blacksmith I constructed a simple but 

 most effectiveDaisy-drawer (as annexed) 

 which enabled me with the least possible 

 trouble to draw out by the roots every 

 Daisy, wild Marjoram, Plantain, &c, 

 on the lawn, and they were not a few. 

 The drawer is pointed, and enters the 

 ground easily in moist weather, and 

 the weed being caught in the fork is 

 drawn out cleanly and more effectually 

 than by any other implement I ever 

 saw, and without making a large hole 

 or disfiguring the turf. — C. B. 



MTTGWOET USED ASA CUKE EOE EPILEPSY. 



The common English name for the plant is Mugwort ; the 

 botanical name is Aetemisia vtjlsaeis, and the local Irish names 

 are Bofulan Ian, Bofulan liath, Bofulan liagh, Liath lus, 

 Mongach measga, Buachalan (but not the Beanchalon huidhe, or 

 Ragwort), and Buafanan. It is known by theBe several names 

 in the different localities in Ireland. The Gaelic name is An 

 Liath-lus, and the Wekh names Bydiawg lioyd, and Camoraidd 

 Iwyd. It is important that we give the several names by which 

 the plant is known in different places ; and the following is a 

 very brief description of it. It is an herbaceous perennial plant, 

 dying down to the ground at the end of the season and spring- 



