December ii, 1895.] 



Garden and Forest. 



499 



Among hard-wooded plants, otherwise known as Australian 

 plants, there is here a grand specimen of Acacia Drummondii. 

 Its long tassels of yellow flowers are borne in the axils of the 

 palmately pinnate leaves near the ends of the branches. A. cultri- 

 formis, with knife-shaped phyllodia of glaucous hue, is repre- 

 sented by a large specimen which promises abundant bloom. 

 The globular flowers are borne in bunches near the ends of the 

 branches. In A. heterophylla the phyllodia are small and very 

 dark green. This forms a handsome small bush, blooming 

 quite freely for a foot or more along the stems. 



The new hybrid Streptocarpuses are becoming common, 

 and their gloxinia-like Howers in blue and white shades 

 are effective in small vases with a little green. An uncom- 

 mon Aroid, Nephthytis picturata, is worthy of note, the white 

 variegation of the leaves taking the form of a Fern-like 

 frond. 



At Mr. J. T. Gardiner's there is a choice collection of Cypri- 

 pediums. All the varieties of the C. insigne type now in 

 bloom are especially good in markings. I was too early to see 

 C. Sanderianum, which is about to bloom for the first time in 

 this country. C. Chamberlainianum was shown at the spring 

 show in Boston, and is still flowering on the same spike. Eiglit 

 blooms have opened, and three more buds are to come. The 

 dorsal sepal is very light green in color ; the petals are narrow, 

 twisted, purple, spotted with brown. A neat little plant of 

 Asparagus deflexus shows a comparatively new decumbent 

 habit, and is apparently well suited for pillar or rafter work. 

 Cocos Weddelliana, one of the most beautiful small Palms, is 

 seldom seen so well grown as here. The Australian plants, 

 which were the late Mr. Atkinson's pride, look uncommonly 

 well under the care of Mr. Thatcher, who was Mr. Atkinson's 

 assistant here for several years. Genista Andreana has re- 

 cently been added to the collection. This handsome brown and 

 yellow flowered Broom, from Normandy, makes a most effec- 

 tive plant for grouping. The Heaths in flower at the time of 

 my visit in November were Erica Cavendishii, yellow ; E. Me- 

 lanthera, small pink flowers with black anthers, and E. ven- 

 tricosa, pink, and the type of the closed corolla group. The 

 Cherokee Rose, in a cool house overhanging a Lily tank, 

 seems perfectly at home and promises an enormous crop of 

 bloom, as also does the Yellow Jessamine of the southern 

 United States, Gelsemium sempervirens. The collection of 

 Phalseonopsis improves every year, and the plants are now the 

 best to be seen anywhere. They include P. Schilleriana, 

 P. amabile and P. Stuartii. They are grown at the warm end 

 of a Cucumber-house, in moisture and heavy shade. The 

 same conditions, with somewhat less shade, appear to suit a 

 fine lot of Eucharis Amazonica, which promise to bloom well 

 during the early spring months. In the cool Orchid-house, 

 plants of Odontoglossum Alexandra are bristling with flower- 

 spikes, and a few are already in bloom. 



Wellesley, Mass. T. D. Hatfield. 



be able to give more definite results for the guidance of 

 growers. 



Viticullural Department, Berkeley, Calif. F. T. Biolctti. 



Late-flowering Golden-rods. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — I notice a reference to this subject on page 45S. Here 

 at Las Cruces, New Mexico, as late as November 15th, after 

 some severe frosts, I was pleased to find Solidago Canadensis 

 in flower, and got from it the last bees of the season, a male 

 Halictus pectoraloides and a female Halictus ligatus. 



Agricul. Expt. station, Mesilla Park, N. M. T. D. A. Cockerell. 



Keeping Grapes through the Winter. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — I have read the remarks in your issue of November 

 13th, regarding the keeping of grapes through the winter 

 with great interest. The method you describe is hardly suf- 

 ficient for our purposes without further precautions, on account 

 of our warmer climate and the greater delicacy of most of our 

 grapes. If kept in a dry place, with the precautions you men- 

 tion, our grapes will keep till December or January, but by that 

 time, if still sound, they become wilted and dried almost to 

 raisins. In order, therefore, to keep them in a perfectly fresh 

 state till spring or summer, they must be surrounded by a moist 

 atmosphere ; then the only difficulty to contend with is their 

 liability to mold. The Agricultural Experiment Station of 

 Berkeley is now experimenting on methods of preventing the 

 development of molds without injury to the grapes. It is yet 

 too soon to predict the results, but the indications are at present 

 in favor of the use of alcoholic or sulphurous vapors. On the 

 termination of the present series of experiments we hope to 



Recent Publications. 



Sir Dietrich Brandis contributes to the Journal of the 

 Linmpafi Society of London a systematic account of the 

 Dipterocarpaceae, a family of tropical Asiatic trees and 

 shrubs, which he groups in five tribes, sixteen genera and 

 three hundred and twenty-five species, although, in view 

 of the imperfect knowledge of the vegetation of the Phil- 

 ippine Islands, portions ol Borneo, Siam and New Guinea, 

 the author believes that it is not unreasonable to suppose 

 that not more than one-half, or, perhaps, two-thirds, of the 

 members of the family are known. 



An interesting peculiarity of the trees of the order is that 

 several of the species are gregarious, forming sometimes 

 nearly pure forests of great area in which one species has 

 overmastered all other trees. In the tropical forests of 

 south-eastern Asia the trees of this family play the part 

 which in this country belongs to Pines and Oaks, Spruces 

 and Firs. The most remarkable of the gregarious species 

 is, perhaps, the Sal, Shorea robusta, the most valuable tim- 

 ber tree of northern India. This great tree forms pure, or 

 nearly pure, forests at the foot of the Himalayas from the 

 Punjab to Assam, and in a climate and soil which suit it 

 no other tree can compete with it. This ascendancy Sir 

 Dietrich ascribes to the fact that the seeds ripen at the 

 commencement of the rainy season after the forest fires of 

 the hot season have passed over the country. The seeds are 

 produced in great abundance nearly every year, and ger- 

 minate quickly. The leaves of the seedling plants are 

 large, and are thus able to choke other seedlings which 

 may spring up among them, and when the ground is 

 burnt over by the jungle fires the following season the 

 seedlings, or most of them, are strong enough to send up 

 fresh shoots when the rains come. The young Sal, more- 

 over, supports shade and will live for years under the dense 

 shade of grass, bushes or other trees. 



Sir Dietrich points out as a remarkable fact that two 

 natural orders of woody plants, Coniferae and Dipterocar- 

 pacea?, whose species often form pure forests, produce resin- 

 ous substances on a large scale in the leaves and deposit 

 them in the wood, a complicated system of resin ducts 

 being found in all parts of Dipterocarpaceae as well as in 

 Coniferae. In the living tissue these substances are found 

 only in a liquid and oily condition, but in the old wood 

 solid crystalline masses are deposited. 



One of the most important of recent contributions to 

 dendrological science, this paper will be read with interest 

 by botanists and foresters. 



American Woods. By Romeyn B. Hough, Lowville, 

 New York. 



Part VI. of this interesting series, like its predecessors, 

 contains sections of twenty-five different species of trees, 

 with the botanical characteristics of each and notes on their 

 properties and uses. All the trees represented in this 

 volume are natives of our Pacific coast, and some of the 

 sections, like those of the i\Iadrona, the California Buckeye 

 and the Mesquite, are of exceptional intere.-^t and beauty. 

 We have so often spoken of this work as its successive vol- 

 umes were issued that it is hardly necessary to repeat now 

 that each species is represented by three very thin sections 

 taken at different planes, one of these being described ap- 

 proximately as transverse, another radial and the third tan- 

 gential to one of tbe annual cylinders of growth, so that a 

 fair idea is presented of the color and grain of both the 

 heart and sap wood of a given tree as they appear when cut 

 at different angles. These specimens and the accompany- 

 ing te.xt have a real educational value. The sections are 

 so attractive in appearance that they make an appropriate 

 holiday gift for any bright boy or girl, and they will prove 

 a source of unfailing pleasure to both the old and the 

 young. 



