70 



Garden and Forest. 



[February 6, 1889. 



Recent Publications. 



Review of Forest-Administration in British India, for the 

 year 1886-87, by B. Ribbintrop, Inspector-General of Forests to 

 the Government of India, Calcutta, 1888. 



It appears from this report, which has just reached us, that 

 the department controlled during the year which it covered 

 811,824 square miles of forests, or anjncrease over the amount 

 reported a year earlier of 3,340 square miles. Some idea of 

 the difficukies the Indian forest officers have to encounter 

 appears in the statement that during the year no less than 

 1,171 cases of prosecution on account of damages of one sort 

 or another were taken to the court, an increase of seventeen 

 per cent, over the previous year. Convictions amounting to 

 seventy-two per cent, of the number of prosecutions were 

 secured. 



Much attention is given to protecting the forests from tire, 

 which has always been their most serious enemy. The whole 

 area controlled by the department has not been brought under 

 the fire-protection system, which, however, is being extended 

 as rapidly as practicable. The total area under protection in 

 all the provinces was 20,335 square miles, and of this protected 

 area, 1,644 square miles were burned over during the year, or 

 eight per cent., a result which is considered satisfactory, and 

 sliows the enormous difficulty of protecting forests over large 

 areas from fire, especially in the case of forests of coniferous 

 trees. The Indian forest administration has always been 

 hampered by certain rights of pasturage in the forests acquired 

 by the entire population through long custom, and the re- 

 served forests suffer seriously from this cause, especially dur- 

 ing dry seasons, when they are called upon to furnish more 

 than usual quotas of pasturage. As an example of the effect 

 of pasturage upon the forest, the case of two compartments in 

 the mountain distinct of Darjeeling is cited ; one field has been 

 closed to cattle during a period of twelve years, while the other 

 had been pastured during the same period. Seedlings and 

 young trees abound in the former, while in the latter young 

 ti'ees or saplings are very rare, and no seedlings exist. 



The following extract refers to Bombay, and is worth careful 

 consideration on the part of the Commission of the Adiron- 

 dack forests, who recommended the expenditure of consider- 

 able sums of money in planting trees upon the exposed rocky 

 hills in the northern part of the state : 



" The Conservator of the Northern Circle speaks very hope- 

 fully of reproduction in all forests where fires and cattle are 

 excluded, and notices that the general experiment in the state 

 of the reserves has been commented upon very frequently by 

 outsiders, and this with special reference to hills which were for- 

 merly bare, but are now gradually covering over with a bushy 

 vegetation, the advance guard of a higher order of plants. . 

 He expresses his conviction that the forest department could, 

 by simple and inexpensive means, restore timber to all the 

 bare hills of the Deccan, provided that fires and cattle are 

 excluded, and the M'ork of natives not interfered with in an 

 irrational manner." 



The gross revenue during the year covered by this report 

 reached a total of $5,016,000, Avhich is the highest figure yet 

 arrived at by the department. The net profits, however, fell 

 slightly below those of the previous year, altliough the net 

 revenue per square mile of forest increased from $8.80 to $9.24. 

 The expenditure of the department includes the formation 

 of new plantations covering 3,939 acres, and the cultivation 

 of 39,924 acres of plantation made previously. 



Periodical Literature. 



In Harper's Magazine for February Mr. John Habberton 

 writes sympathetically and encouragingly of " Bulb Gardens 

 In-doors," explaining the charms of Hyacinths, Tulips, Nar- 

 cissus and kindred flowers, and discussing their relative claims 

 upon the amateur's attention. Many of his liints and counsels 

 are very useful, and his enthusiasm, evidently based on suc- 

 cessful personal experience, ought to encourage his readers to 

 enter upon what is certainly the most satisfactory branch of 

 house-gardening. We must, however, take issue with him 

 when he recommends double Tulips as better than single 

 varieties for in-door gardening. He is doubtless justified by 

 practical considerations. The single Tulip, as he points out, 

 is apt, when grown in this way, either to fail to develop its 

 form in perfection or to lose it soon after it has been attained. 

 " The double Tulip, with several times as many petals, proves 

 that in ' union is strength ' by retaining its form much longer." 

 But when he adds that " there is little or no choice between 

 single and double varieties as to beauty and range of color," 

 he is surely misleading — that is to say, if by "beauty "he means 



the form as well as the color of the flower. In all flowers of 

 this character beauty of form is the most characteristic quality, 

 and to double a Tulip, a Narcissus or a Hyacinth is to decrease 

 its value in the eyes of the true lover of floral beauty to an 

 almost incalculable degree. Who would not be shocked by 

 the idea of a double Bermuda Lily or Lily-of-the- Valley ? Yet 

 the form of a well-grown Tulip is almost as beautiful, and 

 quite as insistently demands respect at the hands of the hor- 

 ticulturist. With Roses the case is different. Some florists' 

 Roses, indeed, are, like double Tulips, mere showy, formless 

 masses of crowded petals. But in others — as in the best varieties 

 of Tea Roses — while the exquisite simplicity of the forin of the 

 wild single Rose has been lost, a new type of form as beautiful 

 in its own way in every stage of growth, and much more sump- 

 tuous and superb, has been achieved. The fact that the differ- 

 ence between double Roses in this respect is so often ignored 

 both by cultivators and by purchasers speaks badly tor the 

 condition of public taste, but by no means excuses the praise 

 too often given to double flowers. One glance at the exquisite 

 drawing by Mr. Hamilton Gibson of a single Tulip and a single 

 Daffodil, which helps to illustrate Mr. Habberton's article, 

 should prove to the reader the folly of tampering with forms 

 that Nature has made so perfect. If single Tulips cannot be 

 well grown in-doors, let double ones be accepted as a make- 

 shift. They can be nothing more than this, for even beauty of 

 color suffers when the petals are so crowded together that 

 their delicate streakings and shadings cannot be clearly dis- 

 cerned. All of Mr. Gibson's drawings, as one might expect, 

 are very charming, and if the most important among them — 

 the "Window Garden" — shows a result of such ideal beauty 

 that few people can hope to reproduce it in their homes, it is 

 well that enthusiasm and vigorous effort should be excited by 

 a realization of what the best success may mean. The little 

 drawing of Freesia refracta alba is particularly pretty. 



Correspondence. 

 The Mistletoe. 



To the Editor- of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — I clip the following frofn an English horticultural jour- 

 nal : " The orchards of Worcestershire supply large quantities 

 of the interesting parasite (Mistletoe), and though considered 

 by some difficult to grow, it is not so. The way to propagate 

 it is to obtain the berries, choose a suitable tree — Apple for 

 preference — select a gnarled bough, and press in the berries 

 in a notch where birds are not likely to pick them out, or cut 

 a slit on the under side of the branch for the reception of the 

 seed. Many an amateur who has an orchard cultivates his 

 own Mistletoe, and a tree with the plant growing amongst the 

 branches is exceedingly picturesque." 



Will you kindly tell me whether the Mistletoe can thus be 

 cultivated in America, and how far north it is hardy ? Year by 

 year at Christmas time there is a demand for it in our large 

 cities, but the supply is small, and purchasers are often dis- 

 pleased with what they get, as it has a withered appearance in 

 both the leaves and the fruit. This appearance is occasioned, 

 I am told, by packing and transportation from distant places, 

 and I think perhaps American amateurs or tradesmen might 

 do well to grow it for themselves, if the thing is feasible. 



Watertown, Conn. F. R. D. 



[The American Mistletoe {Phorodendron fiavescens) is 

 found from southern New Jersey to southern Illinois, and 

 southward. It appears to be most common in some parts 

 of Kentucky and Tennessee, where it does considerable 

 damage to various trees, notably the Black Walnut, which 

 is often killed by the excessive multiplication of the Mistle- 

 toe upon its branches. It is not known that any attempt 

 has been made in the United States to cultivate the Mistle- 

 toe. — Ed.] 



Poison Ivy. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — Gray, in his " Manual of Botany," fifth edition, under 

 Rhus Toxicodendron, L., Poison Ivy, Poison Oak, says the 

 entire leaved form is R. radicans, L. Wood's Class-Book of 

 Botany, 1875, separates the species into R. Toxicodendron, L., 

 Poison Oak, Poison Ivy, and R. radicans, L., Climbing Ivy. 

 • It seems to me that the division of these forms into species 

 is eminently proper, if one may be permitted to generalize 

 from a local herborization. So far as I have observed, i?. Toxico- 

 dendron, with rhombic-ovate, variously notched, sinuate or 

 cut-lobed leaves, is virulently poisonous. R. radicans, which 



