418 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. [ November 22, 1864. 



Vines Unfruitful {M. M.).—If your Vines are at all strong we would 

 let them alone and try them for another year, as you think the border is all 

 right ; but though you may thatch in winter, we would remove the loose 

 slates from the border in summer. If they had been solidly bedded we 

 might suppose .they increased the heat, but being loose they would keep the 

 border cool, and keep sun and air from it. 



Beurke de Rakce Pear ( W. Earley).— This, before it is ripe, is an 

 excellent stewing Pear; and so are others of our first-rate dessert Pears, 

 such as the Beurre" DieL Easter Beurre", and Chaumontel. Your fungus is 

 Nidularia campanulata, usually found on wood shavings. 



Linseed Oil-cake as a Manure {Norfoleensis).— It is quite as good as 

 Rape-cake as a manure, and we have known it successfully used by being 

 trenched in and well-mixed with the soil beneath each drill in which Carrots 

 were sown. This was not only to act as a manure, but to keep the wire- 

 worms from the roots. We cannot help remarking, in connectioa with this, 

 that *'The Driffield and East Riding Pure Linseed Cake Company " is the 

 only one of which we ever read of a shareholder saying that t( If possible, 

 its management gave the shareholders too great satisfaction. " The testi- 

 mony in favour of the purity of its oil-cake must gain the attention of all 

 stock farmers. 



Heated Fern Case {Quite an Amateur).— We employ the Bijou Plant 

 Case made by Mr. Stocks, Cabinet Maker, Archer Street, Westbourne Grove. 

 It is ornamental, heated by Child's night lights, and these, with a green 

 baize cover for winter nights, we find preserve the tenderer Ferns effec- 

 tually. 



Names of Fruit (0. M.).— Pears.— 6, Ne Plus Meuris; 8, Bergaraotte 

 Cadette; 9, Beurre" Diel; 11, Marie Louise; 12, Beurre Bosc; 14, Easter 

 Beurre; 15, Eyewood. Apples. — 1, Russet Nonpareil; 2, Winter Greening; 

 5, Adams' Pearmain; 6. Gravenstein; 7, Winter Pearmain. (J. P-).— 

 5, Winter Hawthornden • 6, Golden Pippin. (R. H. A.).— -I, Swan's Egg; 

 2, Beurre Diel ; 3, Fondante d'Automne; 4, Bergamotte Cadette. Apple— 

 Reinette du Canada. Where the numbers are not mentioned the fruit was 

 unrecognised. (A. P.). — Your Pear seems to be the Red Doyenne\ (J. P. 5., 

 Wimbledon).— 1, Golden Reinette; 2, Colonel Vaughan's. 



Names of Plants (C. W. P.).— Your Orchid flower was completely 

 smashed in transit through the post, and we can make nothing of it. You 

 must send another and better specimen, and tell us what kind of leaves the 

 plant has. (J.M.). — The Saxifrages are too numerous for lis to identify a 

 species from a leaf, but we think it is Sasifraga cotyledon, called by some 

 Botanists S. pyramidalis. {A Young Gardener % Goole) t —l, Scolopendrium 

 vulgare; 2, Pteris hastata ; 3, Nephrolepis tuberosa; 4, Pteris tremula; 

 5, Adiantum capillus- Veneris ; 6, Asplenium trichomanes; 7, Adiantum 

 3etulosum ; 8, Pteris serrulata. Many of the specimens were mere morsels. 

 It is unreasonable to ask any one to identify plants from such fragments. 

 (G. B.).~ Lastrea Filis-mas; the small scrap Lastrea dilatata; the Moss 

 Dicranum glaucum, White Fork Moss. 



POULTRY, BEE, and HOUSEHOLD CHRONICLE- 



BE AHMA POOTEAS. 

 We suppose Dr. Johnson always prefaced his conversation 

 with the word, *' Sir." We can understand that "members" 

 acquire a habit of doing 1 so. We know that many vestry- 

 men and common councilmen make it a practice to do so 

 when they have occasion to speak. We had been reading 

 the "Temple Bar Magazine," and looking at the title-page — 

 "Sir," said Dr. Johnson, "let us take a walk down Fleet 

 Street." We had a sort of inward chuckle, and we said to 

 ourselves, Mr. Editor, Sir, let us walk through your last 

 Number. "■ Brahma Pootras," by our " witty and able cor- 

 respondent." We will make him attorney-general of Brahma 

 Pootra, but we don't believe a word he says, so straight- 

 way we set to work to demolish his arguments. Who has 

 not seen in country churchyards the following epitaph ? — 



" Affliction sore, long time I bore, 

 Physician's aid was vain, 

 Till Heaven did please, my woes to cease, 

 And eased me of my pain." 



Kingsley in his inimitable description of the school where 

 all were over-taught, without reference to age or talent, has 

 paraphrased it thus (or something like it) — 



" Instruction sore, long time I bore, 

 And cramming was in vain, 

 Till Heav'n did please, my woes to ease, 

 With water on the brain." 



Being the epitaph on one of the unfortunate scholars who 

 had sunk under the effort to make him a partaker in all the 

 advantages of modern education. So, considering our able 

 correspondent was buried with the Brahmas, we thought we 

 would try epitaph the third. 



" In Brahmas* cause he made a noise, 

 And fought throughout his days. 

 The J. of H. put him to rest, 

 And killed him with sham praise." 



We wonder if he will ever write again about them. Is, or 

 was, Dr. Bennett, M.D., or Mus. Doc, or LL.D., or (shade 

 of Sydney Smith) D.D. ? If he was the first, he treated the 

 Brahmas and their origin as he would a patent medicine. 

 What would be thought of the man who went to the pro- 



prietors or inventors of Scott's Liver Pills, Holloway's Oint- 

 ment, Barry Du Barry's Bevalenta, or Thorley's Food for 

 Cattle, and asked for the names and proportions of the dif- 

 ferent ingredients ? Or suppose a man in Melbourne, the 

 fortunate possessor of a nugget as large as a dustman's 

 bell, what answer would he give to the passenger who in- 

 quired the exact spot where he found it ? Mr. Bennett is 

 brought up to the rescue, and his weight depends on the 

 "evidence of his own senses." Well, it is clear our "able 

 correspondent" is allowed no such latitude. 



The mother of shows progresses deservedly, and every 

 year the entries increase. This is, we think, most convinc- . 

 ing proof the public approves the entire management of this 

 great show. May its shadow never grow less. 



"Y. B. A. Z." is a good, sound, common-sense writer, 

 and if he be a maniac, there is method in his madness. 

 That is a good idea of his, that the judge or judges is, or 

 are, to give an account of their awards. Fancy the poor 

 man the day after the show opens, meeting his constituents 

 like a member of parliament, to render an account. We 

 should like to be present. 



Sir, we pray you excuse that we have used the first person 

 plural, the editorial " we." We are no editor, but simply — 

 Z. A. B. Y. 



EAILWAT CHAEGES FOE POULTEY. 



I wish, through the medium of your widely circulated 

 Journal, to make known to intending exhibitors of poultry 

 at Birmingham a recent alteration in the scale of charges 

 by the Great Western and London and North Western Eail- 

 way Companies, which will, if acted upon, seriously affect 

 regular exhibitors ; and at the same time I would solicit 

 your influence in trying to obtain a remission of so unjust 

 a charge. According to the new regulations, a printed copy 

 of which I have this day seen, all live poultry will be charged 

 according to the regular scale per pound for distance, andan 

 additional fifty per cent, put on to the already sufficiently high 

 charge. Now this is encouraging poultry shows with a 

 vengeance. 



How I came to know was, I sent a pen of Aylesbury 

 Ducks to Worcester at the regular charge, and on return a 

 demand of half as much more was made upon them. I 

 remonstrated and made inquiry, and such is the result. — 

 Edward Shaw, Plas Wihnot, Oswestry. 



[We hope that the Committees of the Birmingham and 

 other poultry shows will use their influence to have this 

 extra charge rescinded. Directors of railways make the 

 same mistake that the proprietors of periodicals make when 

 they raise their price to compensate for a declining sale. 

 Both would act more wisely if they increased their tempta- 

 tions to win customers. Directors of railways should re- 

 member that poultry shows increase the number of railway 

 passengers.] 



POTJLTEY JUDGES. 



Being from home, I have only just seen " A Cokk Fan- 

 cier's " letter under the above heading in your Journal of 

 the 8th inst. I should not have troubled you with any 

 notice of it but for one or two misstatements which require 

 contradiction. He states of the Judges whom the Cork 

 Committee had appointed, "It so happened both of them 

 were Judges approved of by the Poultry Club." This asser- 

 tion I can only say is entirely without foundation, neither 

 of the gentlemen ever having been even thought of as 

 poultry judges by the Club, and only* one of them _ as a 

 Pigeon judge, though both are known to excel in this di- 

 vision. 



As regards backing out of the matter, I fully intended 

 still sending several entries ; but as for promising the Club's 

 assistance towards the expenses of the Judges, I was not in 

 a position to do so, yet I undertook to bring it before the 

 meeting at Birmingham. 



As "A Cork Fancier" appears so totally ignorant of 

 the Club and its constitution, I beg to inform him it is com- 

 posed of gentlemen of quite equal standing to his Society, 

 and who have only the advancement of poultry shows in 

 view, and to obtain an uniformity of awards, and also do 

 away with all partiality ; and that they are quite as inca- 



