54 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ July 19, 1877. 



much, especially when patronised by ladiea of rank and aided 

 by the clergy, to improve the tastes of an important section of 

 the community. One of the laBt of the city flower shows was 

 held in the parish of St. Philip's, Clerkenwell, when H.R.H. 

 the Marchioness of Lome distributed the prizes ; and Lord 

 Selborne, speaking on the cultivation of flowers, remarked that 

 " nothing was more important to religion and morality than 

 the cultivation of what was natural, and pure, and beautiful. 

 Natural tastes, natural manners, natural habits, natural affec- 

 tions were, they might depend upon it, much better than what 

 was artificial, and therefore the love of nature was a great 

 means of education, and he knew of no branch of the mani- 

 fold varieties of natural objects more calculated to purify and 

 sweeten the taste, and with the taste other qualities, than a 

 love of flowers." 



At the meeting of the Prince Consort's Royal Associa- 

 tion at Windsor on the 13th inst. Messrs. Sutton, the Queen's 

 seedsmen, exhibited a beautiful collection of annuals grown at 

 their seed farm, Reading. It consisted of upwards of two 

 hundred varieties. 



Well may it be said that Kent is the garden of 



England, for Mr. Cannell states that his neighbour Mr. Vinson 

 sent to market last Wednesday 2500 pecks of Steawbebbies. 

 This, reckoning 14 lbs. to the peck, would amount to upwards 

 of 15J tons. 



The bedding- out in Me. Ralli's garden at Cleveland 



House, Clapham Park, has been completed by Mr. Legg, who 

 has won a foremost position by the excellence of his work in 

 artistic garden decoration. In the planting of eight beds and 

 a border fully 200,000 plants have been employed. They are 

 arranged in a different, but none the less effective, manner 

 than in former years. Mr. Legg is an originator, not a copyist, 

 and modes of beautifying flower beds are annually seen in this 

 garden which have not been seen before. By the kindness of 

 the owner of the garden the public will have the privilege of 

 inspecting the beds during Fridays in the months of AugUBt 

 and September. It is expected that the garden will be open 

 to visitors on the first Friday in August — not before — when a 

 display of no ordinary character will be provided in these 

 flowerless yet beautiful beds. The term " oarpet bedding" is 

 no longer applicable to some of these beds, for the bold yet 

 clearly-defined irregularity of surface is foreign to the nature 

 of a carpet, and artistic bedding becomes the more appropriate 

 term. Some of the beds are extremely chaBte and striking. 



Since there is evidence that the Colobado Beetle 



has by some means effected a passage across the Atlantic we 

 must be prepared for rumours of an alarmiBt nature of its 

 appearance in Britain. We are glad that the account which 

 we cited from the Daily News last week of the appearance of 

 the beetle at Dublin proved incorrect ; but it is none the less 

 necessary that a good look-out must be kept for the enemy to 

 prevent its gaining a footing on our shores. 



We regret to announce the death of Mb. Peteb 



Dbumhond, late of Stirling, which took place at Wardie Road, 

 Edinburgh, on the 9th inst. in the seventy-ninth year of his 

 age. Mr. Drummond was for many years the head of the old- 

 established nursery and seed business of W. Drummond and 

 Sons ; and it was mainly to his untiring energy that the 

 house attained the wide reputation it acquired. With him 

 the idea of forming an Agricultural Museum first originated ; 

 and he was also the founder of the Tract Institution at Stir- 

 ling, which became so widely known throughout the world. 



What in many seasons would be very commonplace 



becomes this season noteworthy — a cbop op Apples. We 

 recently saw in the gardens of Munster House, Fulham, a 

 long row of dwarf trees, every one of which is now laden with 

 fruit. The trees are several years old, and on every branch of 

 every tree the fruit hangs like " ropes of Onions." We do not 

 remember ever observing a heavier crop of Apples on any 

 trees. The soil is good and the situation low, and the blossom 

 did not receive any protection. Every tree is of the same sort, 

 and that sort the Hawthornden. 



We record the death oe Me. Wood, late gardener at 



Ravensworth House, Fulham, for two reasons — first because 

 of his great length of servioe in the same family, and secondly 

 beoanse of the unusual cause of his death, which resulted from 



he cutting of a corn and mortification ensuing. Mr. Wood 

 was gardener at Ravensworth House first to the Hon. Thomas 

 Liddel and subsequently to the late and the present Lord 

 Ravensworth, his term of service extending over thirty-five 

 years. He died on the 10th inst in his sixty-sixth year ; he 



was an industrious and trustworthy man, and was muoh re- 

 spected in the neighbourhood in which he lived so long. 



THE CAPER PLANT (Cappakis spinosa). 

 The Caper grows abundantly in the south of Europe, along 

 the shores and on the islands of the Mediterranean, and in 

 Syria. It is generally found wild on walls and rocks ; it is 

 met with on the walls of Rome, Sienna, and Florence, and is 

 extensively cultivated in the south of Europe, particularly be- 

 tween Marseilles and Toulon, and in many parts of Italy ; but 

 it is from Sicily that the greatest supply is brought. The 

 flower buds form the Capers so much used as a pickle and a 

 sauce, but in some parts the fruit is also employed. In the 

 early part of summer the plant begins to flower, and the flowers 

 continue to appear successively till the beginning of winter. 

 The young flower buds are picked every morning, and as they 



Fig. 18.— The Caper Plant (Capparis spinosa). 



are gathered they are put into vinegar and salt ; and this 

 operation continues for Bix months, as long as the plants are 

 in a flowering state. When the season closes, the buds are 

 sorted according to their size and colour, the smallest and 

 greenest being the best ; these are again put into vinegar, and 

 then packed-up for sale and exportation. Capers are stimu- 

 lant, antiscorbutic, and are muoh employed as a condiment, 

 but the medicinal virtues of the plant reside in the root, which 

 is slightly bitter, somewhat acrid and sour, and is diuretic. 



The Caper is, according to Dr. Royle, the Hyssop of Scrip- 

 ture (esob or esof), " which springeth out of the wall," of which 

 Solomon spoke. It produces long trailing branches of suffi- 

 cient length to be used as a stick, on which the sponge filled 

 with vinegar was offered to our Saviour when on the cross. 

 " They filled a sponge with vinegar and put it upon Hyssop," 

 says John (chap. xix. verse 29), and this accounts for the 

 seeming discrepancy which some writers fancy they detect be- 

 tween John's and Matthew's account of the crucifixion, because 

 the latter says they "put it on a reed." It is the same plant 

 which was used by the children of Israel to sprinkle the blood 

 on the door-posts at the institution of the Passover. — (Hogg's 

 Vegetable Kingdom.) 



WRITERS ON ENGLISH GARDENING.— No. 33. 



EOBEET THOMPSON. 



Me. Thompson was born at Eoht in Aberdeenshire early in 

 September, 1798. The precise date of his birth is not known, 

 as at that period the birth registers of Scotland were not pre- 

 served with that care with which they are now. But from his 

 baptism having been on the 16th of October in the same year, 

 we may reckon with some degree of certainty that this cere- 

 mony was performed, as it usually is in Scotland, a month or 

 six weeks after birth. His father was a small farmer, and 



