May 8, 1895.] 



Garden and Forest. 



189 



accounts for the blig'ht which now kills so many plants, 

 and for the need we now have of more skillful cultivation, 

 and both these conditions bear upon the subject of fall 

 planting. No doubt, a little ingenuity may bring a short 

 row into bloom a week earlier than the regular season, but 

 it does not seem to me worth while for the ordinary ama- 

 teur to pay for the extra effort. Fall planting will hasten 

 the flowers very little, but a warm southern exposure, a 

 break against the north wind, well-drained soil that will 

 work early, and fertilizing material well mixed through it 

 so as to be ready for immediate use, will help a great deal. 

 I had a respectable exhibit of Sweet Peas at the Springfield 

 Rose Show on the nineteenth of June last year, and my 

 plants were then beginning to bloom abundantly. This 

 was largely due to the preparation of the ground in autumn, 

 and to liberal annual manuring by which easily digested 

 food was ready for the plants as soon as they started. I am 

 usually ready to exhibit Sweet Peas two or three weeks 

 before the INIassachusetts Horticultural Society fixes the 

 date for the Sweet Pea Show. 



I consider it a great advantage in Sweet Peas to grow 

 slowly during the month of May. They are naturally thrifty 

 plants and very easily take on a fast habit, in which case 

 they run into rank growth of vine without a bloom. Early 

 planting is a safeguard against this, so that the root- 

 growth is made in the cool soil, while the plant grows 

 slovi'ly above ground all through May. Not until the first 

 of June do we want them to make a very perceptible 

 growth above ground, but then they ought to be pushing 

 up at least a foot a week. Not until they make this rapid 

 start should liquid-manure or soapsuds be applied. They 

 are rank feeders and abundant drinkers, and after the tenth 

 of June it is a joy to see them grow straight up six feet 

 and send out a flower-stem at every joint of every 

 branch. zj- , 7 • 



Indian Orchard, Mass. " ■ '' ■ tUllCIUns. 



Notes from West Vii-ginia. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — Of a dozen varieties of Japan Quinces that we have 

 planted here the one called Mrerlosii is the most beautiful. 

 Its softly shaded blossoms of a lively carmine remain in 

 bloom for many days after the flowers on the more common 

 red one have faded. But it does not seem as robust as some 

 other kinds, and last year, between the drought of summer 

 and the extreme cold of winter, it had a hard struggle for ex- 

 istence, dying nearly down to the ground. This spring it has 

 made good growth and sent up many shoots, but it will not 

 bloom. The common-flowered red type, on the contrary, is 

 bloonn'ng as profusely as usual. It is hard to get too many of 

 these Quinces. Their compact growth, beautiful healthy 

 foliage and profuse flowers make them useful in so many 

 ways, as screens, as hedges, as groups and as individual speci- 

 mens. A number of other garden varieties besides Mcertosii 

 have not bloomed this year, but Maule's Quince seems per- 

 fectly hardy. Jasminum nudiflorum has bloomed only on the 

 lower branches, and on the ends of its pendulous shoots 

 which sweep the ground, where a wind-heaped mass of Oak- 

 leaves protected the buds. 



There is one feature of the present season which makes it 

 sadly different from any other spring in my memory, and this 

 is the scarcity of birds. Usually at this time the grove antl 

 garden and the old orchard are jubilant with song from many 

 sparrows, flocks of robins, numbers of blackbirds and blue- 

 birds, redbirds, Carolina wrens and crested titmice. This year 

 we have seen but one pair of robins on the place, and the 

 other Ijirds are proportionately few, except the blackbirds, and 

 these are here in undiminished force. They must be among 

 the hardiest of l)irds. 



The extreme cold weather of the winter, which extended so 

 far southward, must have overtaken the songsters in their 

 winter retreats and slaughtered them l.>y thousands. Even 

 English sparrows, which I had considered proof against cy- 

 clones and blizzards, seem to have succumbed to the cold, as 

 very tew have ventured to invade our home-grounds this 

 spring. This morning only one song-sparrow sang his matins 

 under my window, and later a single white-throated sparrow 

 has rendered at intervals his sweet monotonous chant, which 

 seems to have more of pathos in it than usual. 



Rose Bralie, w. Va. Daiiske Dandridi^c. 



Recent Publications. 



Les Fleurs de Pkine Terre. Vilmorin-Andrieux & Co. 

 Fourth edition. Paris, 1894. 



More than thirty years have passed since the first edition 

 of this work appeared. From that time until the appear- 

 ance of this much enlarged edition the authors have lost 

 no opportunity to improve and enlarge it, and in the fourth 

 edition will be found a manual of hardy plants indispensa- 

 ble to every one interested in their cultivation who is mas- 

 ter of the French language. The value of this work in its 

 present form is much increased by a number of plans of 

 gardens prepared for it by Monsieur Edward Andre, the 

 distinguished landscape-gardener. In this handsome vol- 

 ume, which covers nearly fourteen hundred pages and is 

 profusely and capitally illustrated, the student will find spe- 

 cific directions for raising annual and biennial plants and 

 their subsequent cultivation, and directions for the cultiva- 

 tion of aquatics and hardy perennials. By far the largest part 

 of the work, however, is devoted to an alphabetical list of 

 the best hardy annuals and perennials, with illustrations 

 of many of the most important species. An excellent and 

 most useful addition to this edition is found in the second 

 part in a calendar showing, first, the time when seeds of 

 different plants should be sown, and when they should be 

 transplanted into the garden, and their time of flowering 

 arranged month by month. 



Les Fleurs de Pleine Terre is not a mere compilation, like 

 so many books of its class. In it are recorded the careful 

 experiments and observations of a remarkable family of 

 scientific men who for three generations have labored to 

 elevate horticulture, and more, perhaps, than the members 

 of any other family, have raised it to its present position 

 among the arts. 



Part nine of the first volume of the Conlrihulinns of the 

 Uniicd Stales National Herbarium is devoted to a re])ort 

 made by Mr. J. N. Rose on a collection of plants gathered 

 in the Mexican states of Sonora and Colima, by Dr. Ed- 

 ward Palmer in the years 1S90-91. Dr. Palmer's collections 

 in these years contained no less than eighty-two unde- 

 scribed species, among them a Capparis from the moun- 

 tains near Manzanillo, a compact shrub eight feet high ; a 

 new Crattera, a tree forty feet high, with a trunk fourteen 

 inches in diameter ; an arborescent Morisonia ; a new 

 arborescent Forchhammeria, a photograph of which serves 

 as the frontispiece to this report ; an arborescent Zylosma, 

 a tree thirty feet high ; a new Zizyphus, which Mr. Rose pro- 

 poses to call Zizyphus Mexicana. The fruits of this tree 

 are gathered by the Mexicans and sold in the markets, 

 being used as a substitute for soap and specially valued 

 for washing woolens. Veatchia discolor, first collected in 

 Lower California and described by Bcnlham in the Botany 

 of the Voyage of the Su/phnr, was found l)y Dr. Palmer 

 at Angeles Bay, where it is called Torate Blanco. The bark 

 is shipped to Europe and is said to have valualile dyeing 

 and tanning properties. 



The collection contains two new species of Coccolobis, 

 one of which, curiously enough, was found on the moun- 

 tain sides near Manzanillo, the species of this genus being 

 usually littoral plants growing very frequently with then- 

 roots in brackish water. 



A Palm, doubtfully referred to Cocos, found on the shores 

 across the bay from Manzanillo, is described as a tree one 

 hundred feet high, with large and pinnate leaves. The nuts 

 are used in making soap. 



These recent collections of Dr. Palmer's only serve to 

 emphasize the richness of the ^Mexican flora, which seems 

 practically inexhaustible in undescribed sjiecics and still 

 offers a most im-iting field for the searchers of botanical 

 novelties. Mr. Rose's report, which is illustrated with a 

 number of plates of his new siiccies, is one of the most 

 important of recciit contributions to descriptive botany 

 made in the United States. 



