136 



Garden and Forest. 



[March 12, 1890. 



Notes. 



Eucharis Bakeriana is a new species which has recently 

 flowered in England in the St. Albans nursery, and which has 

 been named by Mr. Sander in compliment to Mr. Baker, of Kew. 

 It has the foliage of E. Amazonica and flowers as large as those 

 of E. Candida; it differs from all other species in having - a con- 

 spicuous trumpet-like corona, as in the Daffodils. As a deco- 

 rative plant it is the equal of E. Candida. 



The first cost of stocking a Narcissus-farm in the Scilly 

 Islands is almost prohibitory except to a capitalist. The roots 

 can be had for ten dollars a thousand, but a single acre will 

 easily swallow up a million roots. Ten thousand dollars for 

 stocking one acre seems like an expensive plant, but the in- 

 crease is such that three acres can be planted the third year, 

 and so long as the demand for the flowers lasts this will prove 

 a lucrative investment. 



The market gardeners of the south, particularly those 

 about Mobile, have suffered seriously this year from injuries 

 inflicted by the cut-worm. Truck farmers were obliged to 

 employ a force of men to begin work at early dawn to search 

 for the destroyers and to set out new plants where the young 

 Cabbages had been cut off. The farmers attribute the great 

 increase in the number of various pests to the extermination 

 of insectivorous birds by pot-hunters, and by boys and others 

 who shoot them out of mere wantonness. 



Successful experiments have been made in Austria for the 

 conversion of corn-husks into paper and cloth. The husks 

 are boiled in an alkali until the fibres are reduced to a spongy 

 condition. The glutine is then pressed from the fibre, which 

 remains as a mass of chain-like, long threads, interspersed 

 with shorter ones. The long fibres are woven into a good 

 quality of coarse cloth, similar to that made from the lower 

 grades of flax and hemp ; and the short ones make an excel- 

 lent paper, very strong, and hard and firm in grain. 



The Cornelian Cherry (Comus mascula) of Europe is now 

 lighting up the shrub-borders of Central Park with its golden 

 bloom. It is surprising that so good a shrub or small tree is 

 planted so little in this country. It should have a place 

 wherever spring flowers are admired, for it never fails to bloom 

 profusely. Later on, when in full foliage, and in late August, 

 when its' cornelian-colored, cherry-like fruits are fully ripe, it is 

 a most attractive object. Up to the present time, moreover, 

 it has escaped the ravages of the destructive larvse of the 

 Cornel Saw-fly, which was described and figured in vol. ii., 

 page 520 of this journal. 



Beyond Boma, according to Mr. Tisdel's interesting account 

 of the Congo Basin in the Century Magazine, there is nothing 

 at all in the valley of the Congo wherein he traveled which one 

 could describe as a forest in any particular. While one does 

 find some large trees, they are few, and principally Man- 

 groves. Nothing indicates that there ever has been a growth 

 of timber. In the first place the soil is not of sufficient 

 depth or richness to produce timber or even to produce any- 

 thing. About the only thing that grows along the valley is 

 wild grass, sometimes ten, twelve, fifteen and even twenty 

 feet high ; and throughout the whole country are zigzag paths 

 made by the natives and utilized by the caravans. 



Harpers' Weekly for February 22d gives an illustration of 

 the new gateway for Harvard University, recently built by 

 Messrs. McKim, Mead & White, together with a reproduction 

 of the design as at first proposed. It was noted in these 

 columns about' a year ago that this design showed a large 

 central gate of wrought iron, flanked by stretches of wall in 

 which were low, round-headed doors, and beyond these tall 

 iron railings. As now constructed, the walls are solid and 

 plain, and an iron gate, smaller than the central one, is placed 

 beyond them on either side. The change is not an improve- 

 ment; yet, as it stands, the entrance is both dignified and 

 appropriate, and the treatment of the iron-work is described 

 as particularly artistic and beautiful. 



A lady writing from Michigan to the American Florist with 

 regard to the rapidity with which bulbs may multiply if undis- 

 turbed for a few years, says : " I thought I would take one 

 Gladiolus bulb and ascertain what the increase would be in 

 five years. I selected Madame Monneret, . . . and in the 

 spring of 1886 I planted one small bulb; in the fall of the 

 same year I had one large bulb and over forty bulblets to 

 plant out in the spring of 1887. In the fall of 1887 I had forty 

 small but blooming bulbs, and, by actual count, 500 bulblets. 

 In the fall of 1888 I had 500 small but blooming bulbs, and, by 

 actual count, 4,500 bulblets. In the fall of 1889 I have 500 

 three-year bulbs, 4,500 two-year bulbs, and the bulblets I have 



not had the patience to count, but thought 50,000 would be a 

 low estimate. Next year would be five years, and I easily 

 could have 50,000 bulbs if it were not for selling them as soon 

 as they become marketable." 



The municipal government of Paris has just purchased the 

 Forestry Pavilion, of which an illustration was given in our 

 issue of January 25th, paying the French Forest Depart- 

 ment $17,000 for it, and workmen are already at work prepar- 

 ing to remove the building from the Trocadero to the Bois de 

 Vincennes, at the other end of Paris. It is pointed out in the 

 Revue des Eaux et Forets that the city has made a foolish bar- 

 gain. The pavilion was erected without permanent founda- 

 tions, which will now have to be provided for it, and these and 

 the cost of removal are estimated at $2,000, making the cost of 

 the building when set up $19,000, which does not include any 

 of the contents, which will have to be provided for in additon, 

 as the Trocadero exhibit is retained by the Forest Department. 

 The great trouble, however, is not in the cost of the building, 

 but in its temporary character, for it is shown that a building 

 constructed of unseasoned logs, and dependent for its beauty 

 upon the preservation of their bark in the natural state, can 

 last at most only two or three years in a presentable condition. 



The milder climate of England means a much earlier spring 

 than ours and the later survival of a multitude of autumnal 

 flowers, so that, in the southern counties at least, there is 

 often not a week in the year when something pretty may not 

 be gathered from the garden. But, on the other hand, our 

 brighter winter skies are far more favorable to plants grown 

 under glass. These facts were commented upon by Mr. 

 Samuel Henshaw in an address recently delivered before the 

 Florists' Club of this city, and the difficulty of forcing Roses 

 in England was especially noted. " All through the middle 

 of the winter," he said, "there is a great scarcity of this 

 flower in England. Even Tea Roses are scarce and poor in 

 quality." Gloire de Dijon Roses and a few varieties of Teas 

 "were exhibited at the spring show in Bristol in March, but 

 were few and very much inferior to what may be seen in any 

 florist's window in the middle of the winter in New York." 

 But in the southern parts of England the Gloire de Dijon "is 

 often seen covering the fronts of cottages and in full bloom 

 in the early part of May." 



The production of Sisal hemp in the Bahama Islands is be- 

 ing rapidly developed, arrangements having been perfected 

 lately to plant 10,000 acres with the Sisal under the stimulating 

 influence of an export duty of £4. 13s. 4d. per ton, paid by the 

 government, on all Sisal hemp grown on the islands. Sisal hemp 

 is produced from a species of Agave (A. rigida, var. Sisalina), a 

 native of Yucatan, where it has been cultivated by the natives 

 ever since the country was known to Europeans, and where of 

 late years its cultivation has immensely increased on account 

 of the growing demands in all parts of the world for larger 

 supplies of Hemp than the East Indies have been able to sup- 

 ply. This great increase in the consumption of hemp-fibre 

 may some day or other have an important influence on the 

 agricultural prosperity of Florida. The climate, soil and vege- 

 tation of the southern shores and islands of Florida are iden- 

 tical with those of the Bahama Islands, and if Sisal hemp can 

 be produced in those islands, it can be grown of as good 

 quality, if not as cheaply, in south Florida, when it is known 

 that the Sisal plant flourishes, and where it is now naturalized 

 and spread over a considerable surface, it having been one of 

 the useful plants introduced into Florida about fifty years ago 

 by Dr. Perrine, who was employed by the government of the 

 United States to study the economic value of various plants 

 and test their adaptability for naturalization in Florida. He 

 made a careful study of the Sisal in Yucatan, and the results 

 of his investigations were published in Senate Doc. 300, Wash- 

 ington, March 12th, 1838. The principal crops of the Florida 

 keys, of which only a very small part are cultivated at all, are 

 tomatoes, grown to supply the northern markets in winter, 

 and pineapples, which suffer during winters of unusual se- 

 verity, and are not, so far as quality goes, a satisfactory crop. 

 Extensive plantations of the Cocoanut have been made on the 

 Atlantic coast; but although there are a few large Cocoanut- 

 trees on Key West and near Bay Biscayne which yield fruit, 

 it is doubtful if the climate of south Florida is sufficiently hot 

 to produce cocoanuts which will be able to compete in the 

 market with those grown under the more favorable conditions 

 which prevail in Jamaica, British Honduras and Guatemala. 

 Sisal is, on the whole, the most promising plant with which to 

 experiment in southern Florida ; and nothing but the cost of 

 labor and machinery in Florida can interfere with the produc- 

 tion of Sisal hemp in competition with that grown in Yucatan 

 or in the Bahama Islands. 



