154 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ Angast 23, 1677. 



of Hope Union. There were 145 exhibitors, and twelve prizes 

 were awarded ; a large proportion of the plants were par- 

 ticularly well grown, especially the Fuchsias and Geraniums. 

 The prizes, which were composed of useful and ornamental 

 articles, were much appreciated by the boys and girls who 

 were fortunate enough in winning them. The Show was very 

 creditable indeed to the Committee, but another season it 

 would be desirable to increase the number of prizes, as a num- 

 ber of well-grown plants were omitted out of the prize list alto- 

 gether for want of funds. From the gardens of Mr. Alderman 

 Finnis, Park Gate, Wanstead, came a collection of Orchids and 

 fine-foliaged plants for exhibition, also a group from Forest 

 House, Leyton, the residence of Mr. Fowler. And we also 

 noted a collection of Gladiolus spikes sent from the gardens of 

 F. Whitbourn, Esq., Ilford. 



Me. Cutleb, Secretary of the Gabdenees' Benevolent 



Institution, will, we understand, attend the principal horti- 

 cultural shows for the purpose of inducing gardeners to sub- 

 scribe to the Institution. 



Although rain in the northern and some of the mid- 

 land districts has been excessive, the neighbourhood of Lon- 

 don affords unmistakeable signs of drought. The commons 

 southward of the City, such as Clapham, where the soil is 

 gravelly, are quite brown and have a much more baked ap- 

 pearance than they have previously had during the summer. 

 The trees, such as Chestnuts and Limes, have a rusted 

 appearance, and their leaves are commencing falling. Rain, 

 which was needed in gardens, also fell heavily yesterday 

 morning. 



■ We are informed that rain has been falling almost 



every day lately in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, and that 

 great fear is entertained that the Potato disease will be very 

 destructive unless a sudden and favourable change should 

 occur to check its progress. In the south the fine weather 

 continues favourable for the grain and Potato harvests. 



Oub correspondent " B. G., Co. Down," writing on the 



Potato disease in Ireland, states that he has seen the mur- 

 rain in many districts. The spring was very backward, and 

 the seed was late planted. Much loss is anticipated amongst 

 the late varieties, as they are now in full growth. The Skerry 

 is almost blight proof, but cannot be cultivated except in fields 

 or on maiden soil. 



Me. Roeeet Osboen of the Fulham Nurseries informs 



us that he has purchased, as from the 1st January last, the 

 nursery and seed business, carried on for many years at 

 Fulham and Sunbury by his late uncle and father, William 

 and Thomas Osborn, and his grandfather, Robert Osborn. 

 This arrangement has received the sanction of the Judge of 

 the Chancery Division of the High Court under whose direction 

 and control the business was conducted for the last few years 

 prior to the present proprietor buying the same. The style of 

 the business will remain as before — " Osborn & Sons." 



■ At the floeal conceet to be held at the Agricultural 



Hall on the 28th inst. prizes varying in amount from £50 to 

 £2 are offered for flowers, fine-foliaged plants, fruits, fountains, 

 and other subjects connected with gardening. It ought to be 

 a largely attended assembly. 



The London Medical Times states that the mines of 



Laurium are generally known to be largely encumbered with 

 Bcoriffi, proceeding from the working of the ancient Greeks, 

 but still containing enough of silon to repay extraction by the 

 improved modern methods. Professor Hendrioh relates that 

 under these scorise, for at least fifteen hundred years, has slept 

 the seed of a Poppy of the genus Glaucium. After the refuse 

 had been removed to the furnace from the whole space which 

 they had covered, have sprung up and flowered the pretty 

 yellow corollas of this flower, which was unknown to modern 

 Bcience, but described by Pliny and Dioscorides. This flower 

 has disappeared for fifteen to twenty centuries, and its repro- 

 duction at this interval is a fact parallel to the fertility of the 

 famouB " mummy " Wheat. 



Db. Geobge Biedwood writes in the "Academy:" — 



" The most sacred plant in the whole indigenous materia 

 medica of India is the Tulsi oe Holy Basil (Ocymum sanc- 

 tum), sacred to Krishna, and called after the nymph Tulasi, 

 beloved of Krishna, and turned by him into this graceful and 

 most fragrant plant. She is, indeed, the Hindu Daphne. The 

 plant is also sacred to Vishnu, whose followers wear necklaces 

 and carry rosaries (used for counting the number of recitations 

 of their deity's name), made of its stalks and roots. For its 



double sanctity it is reared in every Hindu house, where it is 

 daily watered and worshipped by all the members of the house- 

 hold. No doubt also it was on account of its virtues in disin- 

 fecting and vivifying malarious air that it first became in- 

 separable from Hindu houses in India as the protecting spirit 

 or Lar of the family. In the Deccan villages the fair Brah- 

 minee mother may be seen early every morning, after having 

 first ground the corn for the day's bread and performed her 

 simple toilet, walking with glad steps and waving hands round 

 and round the pot of Holy Basil, planted on the four-horned 

 altar built up before each house, invoking the blessings of 

 Heaven on her husband and his children — praying, that is, for 

 less carbonic acid and ever more and more oxygen. The scene 

 always carries one back in mind to the life of ancient Greece, 

 which bo often is found to still live in India, and is a perfect 

 study at once in religion, in science, and in art." 



We are informed that a considerable number of entries 



have been received for the great show to be held at Carlisle, 

 and that preparations for the Exhibition are in an advanced 

 state, the show-ground already being enclosed. 



The employes of Messrs. James Carter & Co. were 



entertained by the firm to a dinner at Sydenham on Saturday 

 last. Forty-four of them — twenty-two from the Holborn 

 establishment and the same number from the Forest Hill 

 Nursery — having previously engaged in a cricket match, when 

 the countrymen proved the victors. The proceedings were 

 much enjoyed by the large assemblage. 



" G. A.," writing tons on Pyeetheum aueeum laclni- 



atum, states that in their early stage the plants were more 

 quick in growth than the familiar Golden Feather. They were 

 planted out in June in much better condition than Golden 

 Feather, not from any greater care being taken of the young 

 plants, but clearly from the great freedom of growth of the 

 new variety. Both varieties are beautiful, yet their beauty is 

 of a different description. Golden Feather is deservedly popu- 

 lar from its close compact dwarf habit and bright yellow foliage. 

 The Cut-leaved on the other hand has very finely-divided foliage, 

 and though it is perfectly golden in colour, its many divisions 

 cause the golden tint to be Eofter, less bright, contrasting only 

 moderately well with Lobelia, but admirably with bolder foliage, 

 as Iresine Herbsti and massive succulents. 



Me. King in his volume entitled " The Southern States 



of North America," observes that "the fitness of Florida for 

 the growth of tbopical and sejittbopical feuits is astonishing. 

 Not only do the Orange, the Lemon, the Lime, and the Citron 

 flourish there, but the Peach, the Grape, the Fig, the Pome- 

 granate, the Plum, all varieties of berries, the Olive, the 

 Banana, and the Pine Apple grow luxuriantly. Black Ham- 

 burgh and White Muscat Grapes fruit finely in the open air ; 

 the Concord and the Scuppernong are grown in vast quantities. 

 The Guava, the Tamarind, the wonderful Alligator Pear, the 

 Plantain, the Cocoa Nut, and the Date, the Almond and the 

 Pecan, luxuriate in southern Florida and the Indian River 

 country. Within these boundaries a tropic land, rich and 

 more strange, will one day be inhabited by thousands of fruit- 

 growers, and where beautiful towns and perhaps cities will 

 spring up. A good tree will bear from 1000 to 3000 Oranges 

 yearly. Some trees at Mandarine have produced 5500, many 

 of the Oranges weighing nearly a pound. One young grove on 

 Indian River, with 1350 trees, produced in a season 700,000 

 Oranges. They were sold for §25 to §68 per 1000 case, and 

 netted to its owner over §20,000. Col. Heart's grove nets him 

 from #12,000 to $15,000 yearly. Dr. Moragne has a grove that 

 nets him over §20,000 per annum. Only one man is required 

 to attend one of these groves, who requires one or two negro 

 men to help to pick and market them. The culture of Oranges 

 will certainly become one of the prime industries of Florida." 



HOYA CARNOSA. 

 It may perhaps interest some of your amateur readers to 

 know that this plant succeeds perfectly as a greenhouse climber. 

 There is a plant here, trained to the back wall of a cool green- 

 house, which occupies about 25 square feet of wall, and I have 

 to-day counted 105 fully expanded trusses of bloom upon it, 

 besides numerous other trusses in all stages of development. 

 This plant receives little care or attention. It is growirjg in a 

 narrow border composed principally of loam. It has water 

 whenever the other plants in the border appear to require 

 it, and this, with an occasional tie or the catting away of a 



