8 4 



Garden and Forest. 



[[February 12, 1890. 



and petals and orange-colored throat. Cattleya Skinneri also 

 appears in many varieties, including several examples of the 

 choice Alba and one of Arnoldiana. Dendrobium Wardianum 

 album and Lcelia Arnoldiana are shown in good specimens, 

 and, in short, there are comparatively few of the really good 

 Orchids now in flower which cannot be studied in this exhi- 

 bition. C. 



Notes. 



The New York Forestry Association, at an adjourned meet- 

 ing on Monday, was reorganized with Mr. Morris K. Jesup as 

 President and Mr. J. B. Harrison as Corresponding Secretary. 

 Additional particulars will be given next week. 



The records of the Park Superintendent prove that the 

 beauty of Central Park is fully appreciated by photographers 

 at least. During the past year 1,700 permits to take photo- 

 graphs in the park were issued, and since January 1st nearly 

 300 have been bestowed or renewed, most of them to amateurs. 



A letter from Para, Brazil, to the Nation, says that lumber 

 forms the cargo of ships from New York to that country, a 

 land possessing, scattered in lavish profusion over thousands 

 of square miles of unbroken forests, sixty-seven varieties of 

 the most valuable woods for structural purposes in the world. 



The Ilhistrirte Gartenzeitung, of Vienna, recently repub- 

 lished the greater part of the accounts of Pinus latifolia in 

 this journal (ii., 496) and Staphylea Bolanderi (ii., 544), 

 saying that the tree " is probably quite unknown as yet in 

 Europe," and that the shrub "has not yet been cultivated 

 with us." 



In the gardens of the Royal Botanical Society, of England, 

 may be seen specimens of the common English Oak, which 

 have been grown to fill ornamental beds. Planted forty or fifty 

 years ago, they have been kept closely clipped, and are now 

 only from ten to twelve inches in height, forming a dense 

 mass of leaves. 



A correspondent of the Philadelphia Ledger writes that 

 active steps are now being taken to establish, at the Univer- 

 sity of Pennsylvania, a thoroughly equipped laboratory of 

 plant-physiology and ^anatomy. Professor W. P. Wilson 

 will go to Europe in the spring to visit the leading laboratories 

 there, and will secure the best instruments and appliances and 

 have them at the University ready for use next autumn. 



Hermann Jaeger, whose death in the seventy-fifth year of his 

 age was recently announced, was a noted German horticulturist, 

 and had long held the position of Grand Ducal Garden Inspector 

 at Eisenach. But he was still more widely known as perhaps 

 the most popular writer in his country upon the practice and 

 the history of gardening. He was a constant contributor to 

 Gartenfiora and other journals, and one of his books was the 

 large illustrated work called " Gardening Art and Gardens in 

 Past and Present Times," which was reviewed in our columns 

 last year. 



Gardeners as well as amateurs often ask why many plants 

 in cultivation flourish best in soils and situations unlike those 

 to which they had been accustomed in their native state. A 

 writer in the Gardeners' Chronicle recently answered this 

 question in a few words. In many cases, he said, plants grow- 

 wild not in those places which are best suited to them, but 

 simply in those where competition permits them to exist, 

 while in gardens their enemies are kept at bay by man, and 

 the most favorable conditions for their development can be 

 supplied. 



The third volume of Dr. F. C. Schiibeler's great work on the 

 trees of Norway — " Viridarium Norvegicum " — has just been 

 issued at Christiana. It is a large quarto of nearly 700 pages, 

 and completes the work, [in which not only the different 

 species of trees native to the country are described and illus- 

 trated, but also a multitude of individuals remarkable for 

 size, antiquity or abnormal development. A voluminous 

 index now adds to the value of the book, and the polar limits 

 of all the trees native to, or grown in, Norway are systemati- 

 cally given. 



Florists' reports indicate a fairly good holiday trade in flow- 

 ers this year, although at New Year's the sales were much 

 smaller than those at Christmas, which was quite contrary to 

 the rule for several years past. The prevailing epidemic un- 

 doubtedly affected the season's gaieties, and, in consequence, 

 the demand for flowers. White flowers constantly grow in 

 favor for decorative uses, now being often employed to the 

 exclusion of all others. It is pleasant to find that, as was the 

 case last year, all florists note an increase in orders for boxes 

 of loose flowers, and a decrease of the desire for "set pieces." 



A German journal, discussing the complaint of a French 

 amateur that the Provence Rose, beloved of his ancestors, is 

 sadly neglected to-day, states that 200 varieties of this Rose 

 were once in cultivation, while hardly more than a dozen are 

 familiar now. One of them was La Belle Villagoise, which was 

 brought from Egypt in the time of the First Empire by the 

 court surgeon, Antoine Dubois, a famous Rose grower. He 

 gave it to the Tilly family in Hallie"e, where it may still be seen, 

 while — so the statement goes — it cannot be seen elsewhere. 

 It is described as having pure white petals streaked with a 

 brilliant rosy red. 



The Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, assisted by 

 the American Philosophical Society and a number of individu- 

 als, has arranged for an exploring expedition to the less known 

 parts of southern Mexico and Yucatan. Specialists in botany 

 and zoology will accompany the geologists, whose chief pur- 

 pose will be to ascertain the general structure of the basin of 

 the Gulf of Mexico, hitherto studied more thoroughly on the 

 Florida side. As yet the archaeologist has done more in the 

 countries referred to than the scientific investigator. The ex- 

 pedition was to sail from New York for Progreso, Yucatan, on 

 the 15th of this month. 



In the Scilly Isles, where the cultivation of Narcissus flowers 

 for market has become so large an industry, the rains and 

 winds which rage there with extraordinary violence used to 

 play havoc with the flowers, destroying thousands of spikes in 

 a night. Close hedges were planted, but these did not avail 

 against the searching winds. Of late years, however, the 

 flower-spikes are carefully cut off and taken in-doors as soon 

 as the buds begin to burst and just show the color of the 

 perianth. Here they are slightly forced by being placed in 

 shallow pans of warm water. The keeping qualities of the 

 flowers are not injured by this process, while their perfection 

 is secured and their opening is hastened a day or two. 



The raising of Peppermint for the manufacture of oil is an 

 important industry-in Wayne County, New York. The plants 

 are set out in May, in rows two feet apart, and grow to be 

 about two feet high by August, when they are cut off close to 

 the roots with a scythe and cured in the sun like hayfor about 

 twelve hours. The extracting of the oil is done by professed dis- 

 tillers, who are paid by a toll, or by farmers themselves in stills 

 of their own. The still is a wooden vat about four feet high by 

 six in diameter. In this the Mint is packed close by treading, 

 covered with an air-tight lid, and subjected to the action of 

 steam forced in from the bottom. The oil is volatilized by the 

 steam and condensed in a worm, and the mixed oil and water, 

 collected in a receiver, separate by specific gravity. It is said 

 that there are a hundred public stills in the county, and it is 

 locally believed that nine-tenths of all the oil of Peppermint 

 used in the world comes from this region. 



A number of prominent physicians of this city met last 

 week for the purpose of protesting against the destruction of 

 the Adirondack woods, because the extraordinary altitude of 

 the plateau, from which still loftier mountains rise, its equable 

 temperature and the hygienic properties of its coniferous trees 

 combine to render it one of the most valuable health resorts 

 in the world, and especially useful for the cure of consump- 

 tion in its earlier stages. Dr. Trudeau, Chief of the sanitarium 

 for the cure of consumption at Saranac Lake, reports that 

 twenty-five per cent, of the incipient cases of consumption 

 treated there are cured, and the health-giving properties of 

 the region can be attested by thousands. An appeal to all 

 public spirited citizens was drawn up requesting aid in the 

 effort to enable the state to acquire such portions of the wilder- 

 ness as had been sold, so that it can be held forever as public 

 ground free to all the people of the state. 



Dr. Moehl, of Cassel, writes to Gartenfiora that the pyra- 

 midal variety of the European Oak {.Quercus pedunculata 

 fastigiata) was first seen during the Seven Years' War, in the 

 Dieburg forest near Harreshausen, in Germany, and that its 

 oldest offspring is the fine specimen which stands by the 

 *' bowling-green " in the park of Wilhelmshohe, near Cassel. 

 In the same park are flourishing young specimens of the 

 fastigiate Hornbeam (Carpinus betulus, var. pyramidalis) 

 which have been propagated from a tree growing wild in the 

 Reinshard forest, near Miinden. This tree was discovered in 

 the winter of 1871-1872 by a hunting party, and stands in a 

 long plantation of Hornbeams which are only from twenty to 

 twenty-five feet in height, while it overtops them, "like a 

 slender Poplar," to a height of about forty feet. It is known 

 that in the year 1820 an order was given to plant this place 

 with natural seedlings of the Hornbeam, so the tree must be 

 about seventy years old. It is said in the neighborhood that 

 its peculiar habit did not show for many years after planting. 



