59 2 



Garden and Forest. 



[December 3, 1890. 



one for East India Orchids, one for Cattleyas, one for cool 

 Orchids, one for Eucharis, two for Carnations, two for Glox- 

 inias, and two for Cyclamens; to these must he added a stove, 

 a fernery, a propagating-house, a conservatory, and eight pits 

 for various Mowers; Twenty-six gardeners care for these houses 

 and the grounds, and the unmarried men among them live in 

 a comfortable house in the gardens, which is provided with a 

 well stocked reading-room and a horticultural library of 300 

 volumes. 



It is said in a late number of the Daytona (Florida) Messen- 

 ger that in many parts of Florida old Indigo-fields are still to 

 be seen, together with vats, drying-houses, store-houses, etc., 

 but for some reason, perhaps because the preparation of In- 

 digo into a marketable article was expensive and unwholesome, 

 the cultivation of this plant has been suspended. The annual 

 export of indigo from the southern states once amounted to 

 about 1,000,000 pounds, but now there are only a few places 

 in Georgia and South Carolina where it is cultivated at all. 

 The Department of Agriculture is making efforts to introduce 

 the cultivation of this plant again into Florida and Louisiana, 

 where, under improved methods of preparation for market 

 which materially lessen the cost of the operation, it ought to 

 prove profitable. The plant requires a moderately rich soil 

 and is ready to cut about three months after the seed is sown. 

 The coloring matter does not exist as indigo in the plant, but 

 when it is steeped in water and subjected to certain processes 

 the blue color is brought out. 



Mr. L. Paparelli, who came last year from Italy to assist 

 Professor Hilgard in the Experiment Station at Berkeley, has 

 prepared a statement for Olive-growers in California concern- 

 ing the methods of pickling the fruit employed in Italy. The 

 olives must be picked by hand some six weeks before they 

 reach maturity. The usual process is to steep them in a 

 solution of caustic soda at the rate of about five ounces to a 

 gallon of water. After soaking a few hours soft water is 

 poured upon them several times until it flows away clear, 

 when the fruit is placed in kegs of brine consisting of one 

 ounce of salt and thirteen ounces of water for each pound of 

 olives. When they are preserved without lye the olives are 

 placed in a wooden vat and submerged in pure water covered 

 with Lemon leaves. The liquid is changed every hour for a 

 month, after which the fruit is placed in vats, with first a layer 

 of salt, then one of olives, then salt again, the proportion 

 being twelve pounds of salt to a hundred pounds of olives. 

 After remaining in the salt for two days clean water is added, 

 and another layer of an inch of salt is placed on top, and in a 

 month after this treatment they are fit for use. The olives 

 are improved by placing aromatic herbs like Fennel among 

 them after the first treatment. 



Fuller, the author of the famous "Worthies of England," 

 published about the middle of the seventeenth century, says 

 with regard to the gardens of Surrey : " Gardening was first 

 brought into England for profit about seventy years ago, be- 

 fore which we fetched most of our cherries from Holland, 

 apples from France, and had hardly a mess of rath peas but 

 from Holland, which were dainties for ladies, they came so 

 far and cost so dear. Since gardening has crept out of Hol- 

 land to Sandwich, Kent, and thence to Surrey, where, though 

 they have given £6 an acre and upward, they have made their 

 rent, lived comfortably, and set many people to work. Oh, 

 the incredible profit by digging of ground ! for though it be 

 confessed that the plow beats the spade out of distance for 

 speed (almost as much as the press beats the pen), yet what 

 the spade wants in the quantity of ground it manureth, it 

 recompensed! with the plenty of food it yielded), that which is 

 set multiplying abundant-fold more than that which is sown. 

 : Tis incredible how many poor people in London live thereon, 

 so that, in somefashion, the gardens feed more people than the 

 field." The reference in the last sentence is evidently to the 

 market-gardens which already abounded in districts that are 

 now a solid part of London, but were then purely suburban in 

 character — Battersea, for example, and Bethnal Green. 



Professor Cook, of Michigan College Experiment Station, 

 has been continuing experiments with the Plum Curculio, and 

 comes to the conclusion that while spraying with thearsenites 

 may be at times successful, it is not always so. Some small 

 trees heavily loaded with fruit were sprayed last season, and 

 though no rain washed the poison away, in less than a week 

 all the plums were stung. Professor Cook therefore concludes 

 that the old reliable method first suggested by the father of 

 Mr. J. J. Thomas, the well known pomologist, remains the 

 surest, cheapest and best method of banishing the Curculio 

 from Plum orchards. With this process the Curculio may be 

 allowed to work until it has sufficiently thinned out the fruit, 



thus rendering the grower a conspicuous service, after which 

 the jarring can begin and the remaining fruit can be saved 

 clean, large and sound. If the fallen fruit is gathered every 

 day under this process the work will be less and less every 

 year. The mallet with which the trees are struck should be 

 well padded, and, even then, unless great care is used serious 

 damage may be done to the trees. In some cases a spike is 

 driven into the tree, and then an iron or wooden mallet with- 

 out a pad may be used, or a limb may be sawed off to receive 

 the blow. Professor Cook thinks it would pay fruit-growers 

 to set Plum-trees thickly among other fruit-trees. The Cur- 

 culio prefers the plum, and will therefore leave apples, 

 cherries and peaches untouched, and the enemy can be fought 

 on the Plum-trees alone. In this way not only a profitable 

 crop of plums can be secured, but the other crops are pro- 

 tected with no other extra expense. 



The death in Paris of Dr. J. Triana, the distinguished bot- 

 anist of New Granada, at the age of sixty-two years, is an- 

 nounced in the last issue of the Revue Horticole which has 

 reached us. For ten years he explored the flora of his native 

 country as a member of the Scientific Commission directed by 

 Codatzzi, and then established himself in France, where the 

 position of Consul-General of New Granada enabled him to 

 reside, for the purpose of describing his collections. His 

 work, however, was always hindered and finally had to be 

 abandoned for the want of financial support from his Govern- 

 ment, and his "Prodromus Floras Novae-Granadensis" did not 

 proceed beyond the Sapindacece. Triana was associated with 

 the late Dr. Planchon in the publication of many of his new 

 species. He published, too, important memoirs on the Gutti- 

 ferece and upon the MclastomacecE. Monsieur Triana, in spite 

 of the numerous discouragements he had to encounter in the 

 last years of his life, never ceased to interest himself in the 

 plants of his native country, and in their applications in medi- 

 cine, in the industrial arts, in horticulture and agriculture. He 

 was a foreign member of the National Agricultural Society of 

 France, and left many devoted friends in France. 



In the death of Mr. Shirley Hibberd, which occurred some- 

 what suddenly on the 16th instant at Kevv, horticulture has lost 

 one of its most devoted apostles, and his country an earnest 

 worker who was always in the van of every movement, horti- 

 cultural or agricultural, intended to promote the interests of 

 either, and of the community at large. For nearly forty years 

 Mr. Hibberd stood in the front rank among English horticul- 

 turists, having from the time when he was quite a young man, 

 up to within a few hours of his death, devoted himself with 

 an ardor equaled only by his ability to the affairs of the gar- 

 den. Experimental gardening was his passion, and it is not 

 too much to say that the present high position of English hor- 

 ticultural art is largely due to Mr. Hibberd 's careful experi- 

 ments, keen observation and thorough teaching. Vegetables 

 of various kinds, fruit, Roses, Pelargoniums, Chrysanthe- 

 mums, Ivies, besides many other plants, were collected and 

 cultivated by him solely with a view to im provement in the plants 

 themselves, bycrossingandselection.or in themethodsof culti- 

 vation. Mr. William Watson sends us an appreciative estimate 

 of Mr. Hibberd's capacity and attainments, from which we ex- 

 tract the following : " He was a most successful teacher. As 

 a writer and lecturer on horticultural subjects he had no equal. 

 He spoke from experience ; his knowledge of his subject was 

 thorough ; he rarely theorized. While possessing a deep and 

 wide knowledge, he also possessed to a remarkable degree 

 the art of conveying it to others both by writing and orally. I 

 never heard a speaker who was better able to inspire one with 

 enthusiasm, to work one up to the highest pitch, to carry one 

 along with him, than Mr. Hibberd. It is probable that his 

 success as a speaker and writer was largely due to the zeal 

 with which he pursued various other subjects besides those 

 which he preferred to be publicly identified with. His knowl- 

 edge of poetry, for instance, Was exceptional. A lecture on 

 Shakespeare which he delivered in Kew scarcely a year ago 

 astonished by its cleverness even those who knew that Shirley 

 Hibberd was no ordinary man. He probably knew every line 

 of Tennyson's best poems. I have heard him, when discours- 

 ing on Tennyson, recite portions of the ' Idylls of the King ' 

 and 'In Memoriam ' in such a way as showed pretty clearly 

 that he had them all by heart. His originality, earnestness 

 and clear-headedness, his restless energy, manliness and 

 downright good nature were shown in everything he did. 

 Among the many eminent horticulturists whom death has 

 claimed this year, the one whose place cannot easily be filled 

 is Mr. Shirley Hibberd. He was born in 1825, was married 

 twice, and leaves only a little daughter of six years behind 

 him." 



