January 2, 1889.] 



Garden and Forest. 



II 



expect that he would perceive that the peculiarities of Ameri- 

 can civilization, as expressed in the tastes, habits, and physical 

 and mental needs of our people, are nowhere so clearly re- 

 vealed as in the importance which the covered piazza has 

 assumed in our country homes of every size and class. The 

 subject has been so recently discussed in these pages, that no 

 further explanation of it is necessary here. We would merely 

 state that although the veranda is once or twice incidentally 

 mentioned in Mr. Osborne's pages, it is nowhere dwelt upon 

 as an important feature, and still less is it recognized as a 

 feature which should be considered in the very beginning with 

 the greatest care as one upon the right arrangement of which 

 the comfort of a country home is always very largely depend- 

 ent, and one which, in many cases, may well have a control- 

 ling influence upon the arrangement of the whole interior. 

 To plan the inside of a country house without distinct refer- 

 ence in every part to the position and extent of its piazzas, and 

 then to add these as chance may allow — this is one of the 

 grossest mistakes into which an American architect can fall ; 

 and it is one, therefore, which should have been guarded 

 against in the very first chapter of a book like Mr. Osborne's. 

 We should have been glad, again, had he said something of 

 the need for considering the approaches to a house, and for 

 consulting a landscape-architect— or, at least, consulting the 

 principles of landscape-architecture — before even the station of 

 the house and of its entrance are decided upon. Perhaps this 

 very vital point will come up for discussion in his second vol- 

 ume ; but it is one, we must say again, which might better 

 have been explained at the beginning, since it must be under- 

 stood and settled at the beginning, if at all, whenever the 

 student commences actual construction. 



Periodical Literature. 



THE flower trade of London is estimated at /s, 000 a day, 

 and, as well as the trade in fresh fruits, is rapidly increas- 

 ing, a fact which is held by Mr. Sampson Moi'gan, whose inter- 

 esting paper upon ' Imported Flowers ' has recently been 

 issued, by the Cobden Club as one of their ' Leaflets ' to 

 show "that there is improvement in a nation whose taste is 

 changing in such a remarkable manner from drink to fruit, 

 and from gaudy gildings to fragrant fiowers." 



From the same paper it appears that "between Nice and 

 Cannes to London, especially diu-ing the winter and spring, 

 there is a special railway and postal service by which the 

 flower cultivators of France are enabled to pour into the 

 English markets such things as White Lilac, Violets, Snow- 

 tlrops, Lilies-of-the-Valley, Daffodils, Roses, Hyacinths and 

 Fern by the thousand dozen bunches at the time ; in fact, 

 these consignments are at times prodigious. The growers 

 of the Riviera and elsewhere in the south of France are now 

 paying special attention to the culture of cut flowers for the 

 English markets; and when we consider the tasty manner in 

 which their consignments are got up, one can hardly be sur- 

 prised that these goods have l)ecome so deservedly popular 

 with English buyers. Many men might be mentioned whose 

 names in our markets have almost become household 

 words ; but I woidd simply refer to M. Solignac, of Cannes, 

 whose chainps-fleurs (field-flowers) have for years past been 

 so much sought after and bought up, especially Ijy the Lon- 

 don florist, and who, it is believed, disposes of various kinds 

 of flowers, such as Roses, Carnations, Violets, Anemones 

 and " Marguerites," annually, to the extent of ^^12,000, and in 

 the face of this fact we can easily see that it must be a very 

 profitable branch of trade. Of course his goods are well 

 grown, and for some years dining the "great run "on the 

 " Yellow Marguerite," his consignments secured very high 

 prices indeed. Further, Mr. Potter points out a fact that is 

 totally ignored, even by men in the horticultural world, for 

 although these flowers are called in France Champ s-fleurs, 

 yet they are always protected mostly with glass, and the 

 ranges of these glass erections at Cannes, and especially on 

 the liill-sides, is a sight worth seeing. 



"The principal kinds of flowers imported to our markets, 

 especially Covent Garden, from the Continent, etc., consist 

 of Lilac and Syringa, Violets, l)oth Parma and the Czar, and 

 Mignonette and Lent Lilies, in enormous quantities. Mimosa 

 or Acacia in two or three kinds, Narcissus in several varie- 

 ties, including Paper White, Douljle Roman, Grand Mon- 

 arque, Soleil d'Or, and the White Roman Hyacinth. All the 

 above, if English grown, realize a better price in the market, 

 Ijut they are not grown in sufficient quantity in this country, 

 and the Anglo-French salesmen in Covent Garden are now — 

 during the winter, I might state, without hesitation — the most 

 important venders in the market, and they ai'e fully awai'e of 



their importance. Safrano Roses, too, are sent us in aVjund- 

 ance, and Fern, the black Spleenwort, Asplenium 'ax\(\ Adian- 

 tum nigriini, known as French Fern, are disposed of to the 

 tune of some thousands of pounds. Orange blossom, too, is 

 another imported article that fetches a large sum. 



The following extracts taken from this instructive paper 

 are of general interest: 



" It is said that attar of Roses, manufactured in the Valley 

 of Kesanlik, Roumelia, is exported to the value of _^44,ooo ; 

 and some one has made a calculation to show that ten 

 billions one hundred and four millions of blossoms are used 

 each year at this one place alone. In connection with flower 

 cidture on the Continent, and now in the United States of 

 America, the manufacture of perfumes from flowers forms 

 a very profitable industry, and one which certainly might be 

 adopted by the English grower. The town of Grasse, near 

 Cannes, the capital of the department of the Alpes Marl- 

 times, is the centre of a flower-growing district, and the prin- 

 cipal seat of the manufacture of perfumes in France. 



" It is stated that the famous attar of Roses is made from 

 i\\Q Rosa Damascena, which grows like »a weed in Smyrna, 

 and in some parts of Tiu'key and France, though the growth 

 is comparatively small in the latter country. The natives of 

 these places collect this oil in a simple manner. The Roses 

 are placed in water, and after decomposition sets in, the oil 

 floats on the surface, and is absorbed by cotton balls deftly 

 dipped into the liquid. The cotton under pressure gives up 

 this oil, which is bottled and sealed. A bushel of flowers 

 will produce only a few drops of oil. The genuine is the 

 most expensive oil in the market and worth over £^ an 

 ounce. It is adulterated with oil of rhodium, wax and other 

 substances, and the price is arranged to suit the purchaser. 

 The strength of this oil makes it sickening in its natural 

 state. The adulteration has reached such a high state of 

 perfection that even the most expert judges of perfumes are 

 deceived by it. 



" Patchouli is made from a natural plant growing in great 

 alumdance in the Malay Islands, and is a great favorite as a 

 perfume. There is a growing demand now for lavender 

 water. It is made by mixing Rose and Orange waters with 

 the oil of lavender, and has a refined and pleasant as well as 

 refreshing odor. The English oil of lavender is the best 

 that is on the market, and besides being used as a perfume, 

 is a favorite article in bakeries as a flavor for cakes and 

 fancy products. It is a high stimulant and an efficient aid to 

 digestion until the system becomes used to it, and then it is 

 liable to breed one of the worst forms of dyspepsia. The 

 Lavender shrub and the Jessamine plant are cultivated to a 

 large extent in England and France for this industry. The 

 genuine Heliotrope is not as fine an odor as the imitation. 

 The latter is known as the White Heliotrope, and is made 

 from a combination of violet and vanilla, and has a soporific 

 tendency if breathed any length of time. Bergamot, with 

 musk, forms the staple perfume of the colored. ' 



It was not until the year 1652 that Coffee was introeluced into 

 London as an article of commerce and that the first Coffee 

 house was opened by a Greek named Pasgua Rossie. For 

 many years Arabia, where the Coffee plant had been intro- 

 duced from Abyssinia, was the only country which produced 

 it, but in 1696 the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies 

 procured a few of the seed and planted them in a garden at 

 Batavia. The plants flourished and some were sent to Java, 

 whence one went to tlie Botanic Garden in Amsterdam. From 

 this plant seedlings were raised and sent to Suinam, where 

 the cultivation of Coffee was established in 1718. Ten years 

 later plants from the same source were sent to the West 

 Indies, so that the offspring of the single plant which grew in 

 the Amsterdam garden now produces, it is said, more Coffee 

 than all the other plants in the world. These statements are 

 taken from the fifth bulletin issued by the Botanical Depart- 

 ment of Trinidad, which is devoted to "A Short Treatise on 

 Coffee Cultivation," filled with practical instruction upon the 

 cultivafion of Coffee in the Island of Trinidad, including 

 directions for selecting sites for plantations, clearing land, the 

 formation of nursei'ies, planting, weeding, pruning, manuring, 

 harvesting and curing the crop, with descriptions of the most 

 improved machinery now used in preparing the berries for 

 market. Half a dozen varieties of different origin of the 

 Abyssinian plant [Coffca Arabica) are cultivated in the Trinidad 

 Botanic Garden, as well as the species discovered a few years 

 ago on the west coast of Africa and known as the Liberian 

 Coffee (C Liherica) and now widely disseminated in Coffee- 

 growing countries. This jjlant flourishes in Trinidad and has 

 already attained a height of thirty feet, producing large crops 



