460 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 397. 



height of fifty feet, and a specimen with larger trunk and nearly 

 as tall, from Santa Barbara, stands in the lawn. 



The Louisiana Building, which represents a plantation- 

 house, has various good plants in the yard, but they exist as 

 individual specimens only. Here are Roses, Bambusa falcata, 

 Caladiums, Loquats, Palms, Camphor-tree, Pittosporum To- 

 bira and a bush of Evonymus Japonica six feet high. The gray 

 moss, or Tillandsia, hanging from the Catalpa-trees in front of 

 the house, give a southern feeling to the place. The Missouri 

 Building was conspicuous during the whole summer and fall 

 for its excellent bank of Solanum Warsewiczioides which 

 masked the foundations. The French Building, upon the lake 

 front, has had some striking effects, especially in gaudy edg- 

 ings of Cineraria, Alternanthera and Lobelia. Various varie- 

 gated or otherwise interesting specimen shrubs have been 

 conspicuous, particularly Ilexes and Evonymuses. Rhodo- 

 dendrons and Altheas are also used, and there are a lot of 

 good Phcenixes from Martichon, of Cannes. But the orna- 

 mentation about the French Pavilion, as about the California 

 Building, has a much too scattered character to answer the 

 purposes of landscape effect. , ,, _ ., 



Chicago, 111. L. H. Bailey. 



Notes. 



The Chrysanthemum exhibition of Pitcher & Manda at Short 

 Hills, New Jersey, is thronged with visitors as we go to press, 

 and will continue the week through. A neat little pamphlet on 

 the history, classification and cultivation of the Chrysanthemum 

 is given to each one, and the blank pages for memoranda op- 

 posite the names or numbers of new varieties are very conve- 

 nient for those who wish to make notes of special characters. 

 A more complete account of this exhibition will be given in 

 the issue of next week, 



A correspondent of the Gardeners' Magazine urges the use 

 of bones as drainage for Chrysanthemums in the place of 

 potsherds. His experience is that fresh bones, which, when 

 buried, begin to decay and smell offensive, seem to injure the 

 plants, the tips of them stopping short and appearing as if 

 burnt. But when old and dried bones are used, the roots 

 soon adhere to them and the plants show the advantage of 

 this treatment by remarkable vigor. It is suggested that 

 when fresh bones are to be used they should be buried two 

 months at least before use, so that they can go through the 

 first stage of decomposition. If they are then taken care of 

 they will answer much better purpose the following year. 



A shingle-roof which had been put on fifty-three years ago 

 was lately removed from a house in Nashville, Tennessee. 

 Four kinds of shingles were used indiscriminately — poplar, 

 oak, chestnut and walnut. The poplar shingles led in sound- 

 ness, followed in order by the chestnut, walnut and oak. The 

 chestnut had simply worn away, the walnut had a dry rot on 

 the under side of the exposed portion, and the oak had rotted. 

 The shingles were rived and hand-drawn. It is not probable 

 that a modern sawed shingle of either wood would have lasted 

 half as long. Besides cutting across the open ducts of the 

 wood, and affording inlets for moisture, the saw leaves a fuzz 

 on the surface of the shingle which causes it to dry off more 

 slowly after a rain. 



To Dr. N. M. Glatfelter we are indebted for a copy of his pa- 

 per on the venation of Willow-leaves, printed in advance 

 from the fifth annual report of the Missouri Botanic Garden. 

 This is an attempt to group twenty-three species of North 

 American Willow according to the venation of their leaves, 

 and to find characters by which they can be recognized by this 

 means. Whether in practice such a scheme will be found of 

 value, only use can tell. It will have, of course, the disadvan- 

 tage that different species have sometimes a very similar ar- 

 rangement of leaf-veins, and that, as Dr. Glatfelter points out, 

 there is often considerable variation in this respect in the same 

 species at different seasons of the year. The paper is accom- 

 panied by a glossary of terms which might in some cases be 

 advantageously substituted for the rather loose expressions 

 usually used in describing the leaves of plants. 



Persons interested in the discussions which have appeared 

 in recent years in botanical journals between the advocates of 

 the mechanical and physiological theories on the origin and 

 purpose of Cypress-knees, will find an interesting paper on this 

 subject in the fourth part of the fifth volume of Studies from 

 the Biological Laboratory of the Johns Hopkins University, 

 from the pen of Dr John P. Lotsy, in which the development 

 of the knees is explained and well illustrated, without, how- 

 ever, any theory of their use being established or proposed. 

 The discovery of a fungus in the knees, with no trace of myce- 



lium except near the top, suggests the idea that it is this fun- 

 gus which may be the cause of the formation of the knees; 

 although, of course, this can only be demonstrated by cul- 

 tural experiments. Unfortunately, Dr. Lotsy's material was 

 preserved in strong alcohol, so his attempts to germinate the 

 spores of the fungus were rendered impossible. This paper 

 is preliminary to an exhaustive study of the subject. 



In a paper on Strawberries, read before the Columbus Hor- 

 ticultural Society, Professor Lazenby gave the following sum- 

 mary of the essential points to be kept in mind by cultiva- 

 tors : (i) The most profitable varieties for the commercial 

 grower are those not easily influenced by differences of soil 

 and climate. Those which succeed well on wide areas are 

 usually better than those which have a more local reputation. 

 (2) Pistillate varieties, when properly fertilized, are more pro- 

 ductive than the sorts with perfect flowers. (3) The value of 

 a variety for fertilizing pistillate flowers does not depend so 

 much upon the amount as upon the potency of its pollen. 

 (4) The flowers of pistillate varieties are less liable to be in- 

 jured by the frost than the flowers of perfect varieties. (5) 

 Varieties that are neither very early nor very late in point of 

 maturity are the most productive and have the longest fruit- 

 ing season. (6) As a rule, varieties that have the most vigor- 

 ous and healthy foliage are the least productive, while those 

 with a weaker growth of foliage and a greater susceptibihty to 

 leaf-blight are usually the more prolific. (7) Winter protection 

 may be dispensed with upon well-drained sandy soils, but ap- 

 pears to be a necessity upon heavier ones. (8) The leaf-blight 

 may be checked by using the Bordeaux mixture, beginning 

 just as soon as the leaves appear and continuing the applica- 

 tion every few weeks throughout the season. 



A correspondent of the Journal of Horticulture considers 

 that wild-flower competitions are among the most satisfactory 

 of flower shows. In many places in England there are often 

 fifty entries for a bouquet of wild flowers by children, who are 

 in this way taught to arrange their flowers tastefully. In such 

 a competition the work of arrangement should be done by the 

 children themselves, and they should receive no help from 

 others. To secure this result a rule is inserted in some sched- 

 ules stating that the children's bouquets are to be arranged at 

 the place of exhibition, where each child is allowed a space on 

 the table with ample room to work, under the supervision of 

 a committee. Perhaps this is not the best method of securing 

 a good display, but in one village eighty little workers were 

 seen engaged on the morning of a show with a committee-man 

 in charge sitting at the end of the table. Some of the bunches 

 came out in very uncouth forms, but many more indicated 

 clearly that the exhibitors had been practicing for some time, 

 and this would prove that the object of educating the children 

 in this direction had been partially attained. In this country 

 we have noticed very few prizes given for the arrangement of 

 wild flowers, but wherever there has been a prize for collec- 

 tions with the correct names of the plants which were staged, 

 the result has always been interesting. Exhibitions of wild 

 flowers can hardly help exciting a useful educational influence. 



Salway peaches, comparing favorably in quality and size 

 with any California peaches seen here this season, were a part 

 of the forty-four car-loads of California fruit sold in this city 

 last week ; the best of these bring seventy-five cents a dozen 

 at retail, the other kinds from that state now seen here being 

 Bilyeu, October Blush and October Late. A fewjpeachesfrom 

 Connecticut and northern New York may still be had, but the 

 long market season of peaches, which began with the arrival 

 of the first Peentos from Florida in the middle of May, is about 

 ended. Grapes make the staple fruit shipments from Cali- 

 fornia, while from eastern vineyards above two hundred car- 

 loads are reaching this city each week. Choice Black Muscat 

 grapes, from Rhode Island hot-houses, bring a dollar apound, 

 and selected bunches of Gros Colman, from Long Island, a 

 dollar and a half. Coe's Late Red plum is the only Cahfornia 

 plum now offering, and sells at eighty cents for a five-pound 

 box. Lawrence pears, from New York state, of extra size, 

 bring sixty cents a dozen. Jamaica oranges, which are riper 

 and sweeter than the Florida fruit at this time, find ready sale 

 at fifty cents a dozen for the largest, Satsuma oranges from 

 Florida being sixty cents a dozen. California quinces of enor- 

 mous size are a feature of side-walk fruit-stands, where they 

 are offered atfrom fifteen to twenty-five cents apiece. Pome- 

 granates from Spain are a dollar a dozen, and the first Italian 

 chestnuts bring twenty cents a pound. Cranberries are accu- 

 mulating on the hands of the wholesale dealers ; the fruit is 

 almost without demand, and the large stock will make slow 

 sales until the advent of cold weather. 



