254 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ September 27, 1377. 



having no wall for shelter, but everything appears to do well 

 in it, and the crop of Apples and other fruits here is first- 

 rate, which, unfortunately, is more than can be said of every 

 garden this season. All the vegetables here show the excel- 

 lency of the soil and management. " Winter stuff " of various 

 kind form the chief crops, and the demand must be great indeed 

 that will exceed such a supply. 



As yet there is hardly any flower garden at Cardiff Castle, 

 but this will be in proportion to the rest in a few years. A 

 few beds are laid down on grass not far from Mr. Pettigrew's 

 house. The Tory Viola, a splendid purple, raised by Messrs. 

 Dickeons & Co. a few years ago, is very effective here. Dum- 

 fries House Seedling Tropasolum, raised by Mr. Pettigrew when 

 gardener at a place of this name belonging to the Marquis of 

 Bute in Ayrshire, is grown in quantity against some of the 

 walls. It is a quick climber, and becomes a perfect sheet of 

 orange-scarlet flowers. 



There is only one thing to be regretted about Cardiff Castle 

 and the gardens, and that is their closeness to the town of 

 Cardiff, which deprives the place of that seclusion so desirable 

 about such a noble seat. A stone might be thrown out of the 

 Castle windowB on to some of the streets, and the kitchen gar- 

 den containing the glass houses is so close to the town houses 

 that many of the windows overlook the garden. — Visitor. 



ATTAR OF KOSES. 

 Ouk Naval Correspondent, who has been stationed with the 

 Turkish army engaged under Suleiman Pasha in attacking the 

 Russians in the Shipka Pass, takes the opportunity of a pause 

 in the conflict to discuss the very different subject of Rose 

 water. He writes from Kezanlik : — 



"Perhaps there are few more fertile valleys in Europe than 

 this once flourishing valley of the Tundja, which lies between 

 the greater and lesser ranges of the Balkans, and stretches east 

 and, west for upwards of 130 miles. Although the nature of the 

 soil, naturally varies very considerably in such an extensive 

 tract of oountry, still there is no one part that can. be called bad 

 or unprofitable, and, according to the locality, be it sandy slope 

 with a southern exposure, as is the case on the north side of the 

 valley, or alluvial lands in the lower parts, which in winter are 

 converted into swamp by the swollen mountain streams, so 

 whatever toil or labour the husbandman bestows he is repaid 

 tenfold. To climb some of the lower ranges on the north side, 

 which generally rise rather abruptly in rocky terraces imme- 

 diately behind the villages, and look down on the varied colours 

 of different cultivations, is a great treat for those to whom 

 diversity in landscape has a charm. OrLthe highest slopes grow 

 the hardy Vines with their brilliant green leaves festooning 

 themselves from one short pole to another, or trailing over the 

 ground in the more stony- places, as they do on the Lebanon. 

 Next come the duller patches of Tobacco, at this season bearing 

 the rose-coloured flower- which spreads a. flush over the whole 

 field. Intermingled with these fields are the fields of Roses, the 

 glory of the valley of the Tundja, growing in even rows, forming 

 long lines like hedges, 4 or 5 feet high. Below these again are 

 Wheat and Barley, with strips of pasture land, dark groves of 

 Elm trees, red-roofed villages, and white minarets. 



" As is generally known, this district is the most fertile in 

 the TurkiBh empire for the production of attar of Roses ; and, 

 as little is known of this curious and interesting process, a few 

 words as to how the RoseB are grown and how the essence is 

 extracted may be permitted. This district, which is called the 

 district of Kezanlik, produces annually more of the essence than 

 all the other Rose-growing districts of Turkey put together. 

 The whole quantity produced in Turkey may be rougLly esti- 

 mated at 3600 lbs. annually, of which 1800 lbs. are manufac- 

 tured in this district, and the rest in seven other districts, all 

 alike in the Sandjak, or Province, of Philippopolis. 



" The soil best suited for the cultivation of Roses is what we 

 find in such large tracts of land in this neighbourhood — namely, 

 sandy slopes with a southern exposure, and the method of plant- 

 ing and rearing is as follows : In spring and autumn parallel 

 trenches a few inches deep are dug in the soil selected about 

 1| yard apart, and in these trenches are placed short branohes 

 taken from an old Rose tree. These must not be cut off the old 

 plant, but torn off, so as to carry with them part of the peel or 

 bark of the plant. They are placed in the trench so as to form 

 a continuous line, and the earth with some manure is then filled 

 in. In about six months small plants begin to show above the 

 ground, but bear no Roses until the second year, and these are 

 of no great value. The third year's crop is fit for the production 

 of the essence, and by the fifth year the plant is at its best. It 

 remains in this condition for several years, but after about four- 

 teen or fifteen years the quality of the Roses has so deteriorated 

 and the bushes grown so thick that replanting is necessary. 

 By this time they may be 6 feet high. The Rose tree is a very 



delicate plant and requires constant care. The value of the 

 crop varies with the attention that is paid to them, the care in 

 turning the earth, which has to be done three or four times 

 a year, and the quality of the manure used. The frosts of winter 

 do not affect the plantB if they are continuous, but any sudden 

 changes, especially towards spring, are most fatal. Hoar frost 

 and fog when the first buds are appearing are also much dreaded. 

 About the way of trimming the plants I could gather no infor- 

 mation, but from their appearance it would seem that very little 

 is done in this direction except cutting away dead wood. Bud- 

 ding appears quite unknown to them, nor would there be much 

 use for this delicate art. There are few industries requiring 

 more practical knowledge than the production of attar of Roses. 

 When we take into consideration the immense amount of labour 

 and land that is required to produce a very small bottle of this 

 precious liquid, it will not surprise one to see how few people 

 eDgage in the cultivation of the Rose. As April draws to an 

 end the cultivator begins carefully Btudying his field, almost 

 counting the buds, and scrutinising the heavens for any obange 

 in the weather which may necessitate his beginning his recolte 

 earlier. A sudden burst of warm weather may bring his buds 

 forward so rapidly in a day or two that he Btands in danger of 

 losing his whole crop because he cannot gather it all in ; or a 

 hoar froet, though not killing the buds, may take all the scent 

 out of them and make his crop comparatively valueless. As the 

 crop of flowers advances towards harvest time the cultivator has 

 to make a kind of rough estimate of the quantity of buds and 

 flowers that he must gather each day. This is limited by the 

 amount of labour he can command to pick the young fresh-blown 

 Roses before sunrise and by the quantity he can distil at one 

 time, for the sun soon dispels the scent, and the flowers must 

 go immediately into the still. Thus supposing he sees or judges 

 that it will take ten days for the whole crop to come to perfec- 

 tion, he must in the first morning gather a tenth of his crop 

 and proceed to distil that quantity, and this will explain why a 

 sudden burst of heat forcing on the whole crop is so disadvan- 

 tageous. It also appears that any great heat during the time of 

 distillation causes the quality of the essence to deteriorate. The 

 distillation is carried on in the most primitive manner, and yet 

 seems to answer the pnrpose as effectually as would any more 

 complicated or scientific method. The still itself in form re- 

 sembles a huge copper bottle, with aneck consisting of a smaller 

 chamber. The height of this still is about 5 feet.. From, the 

 top a pipe passes into a receiver, through which the distilled 

 water passes. Into this Btill is placed a quantity of Roses, with 

 ten times as much water, and the distillation is carried on until 

 the amount of liquid in the receiver equals in weight the amount 

 of Roses in the still. The RoseB are then thrown ont and a 

 fresh quantity put in, and the process is repeated until all the 

 water is evaporated, when a freBh operation begins. The liquid 

 thus obtained is Rose water, which is again Bubjeoted to distil- 

 lation, when the real essence is produced in the form of a pale 

 yellow oil. The quantity of essence that a given number of 

 Roses will produce is very uncertain, but a rough average may 

 be taken that to produce 1 lb. weight of the essence it requires 

 the astonishing weight of 28 cwt. 



"From this may be gathered some idea of tha enormous 

 amount of land occupied and labour bestowed on the cultivation 

 of Roses in this district alone, which annually produces upwards 

 of 1800 lbs. to 2000 lbs. weight of the essence. There are no 

 large farmers of Roses. The rural population have the manu- 

 facture entirely in their own hands, and every man that has a 

 small field of Roses has also his distilling apparatus. Very 

 often among the poorer Bulgarians this constitutes their entire 

 capital, with a small field of Maize, a few Plum trees, and a few 

 Vines. 



"In this way the inhabitants of the valley of the Tundja 

 passed their lives, in that degree of ease which Turkish ex- 

 tortion and every kind of bad government would permit them, 

 and in comparison with the poor Irish or the country clod in 

 England they were well off and happy. 



" But a misfortune of a terrible kind has overtaken Bulgarian 

 and Turk alike, and in the whole length and breadth of that 

 exquisite valley there is hardly a houBe standing or a crop that 

 has not been destroyed. I am Bitting under the verandah of one 

 of the two remaining houses of a large village called Chourloo, 

 about two miles from the entrance of the Shipka Pass. In this 

 village upwards of eighty Turkish women and children were 

 massacred by Bulgarians, and my host, with Turkish sang froid, 

 is sitting smoking croRB-legged under a pergola of Vines, about 

 10 feet from a small heap of earth where his wife lies buried. 

 She waB massacred a day or two before the army of Suleiman 

 arrived. Behind the house, thrown on to the manure heap, 

 and pioked as clean as bones can be by orows and dogs, lies the 

 skeleton of his uncle. Ten minutes' ride carries you to a Bul- 

 garian village, where exactly the same sights are to be seen, 

 though in the proportion of about ten to one of victims. The 

 most impartial cannot but admit that the Bulgarians have 

 suffered far more than the Mahomedan population. 



"In pondering over the future of this country, one of the 



