SErXEMEER 7, 1892.] 



Garden and Forest. 



423 



cenias, in luxuriant Iiealtli and beauty ; and tlic Cape Disa 

 g-randillora bore flowers as large, and as line in color, as 

 Harvey had seen them on Table Mountain only a year or two 

 before. Mr. F. W. Moore, now of Glasucvin, also had charge 

 of the gardens, and by his zeal and well-directetl industry con- 

 tributed to their present prosperous condition. 



Without undue boasting, it may fairly claim to be, in pro- 

 portion to its size and general conveniences, a garden as rich 

 in vegetation of all kinds as exists elsewhere in Europe. The 

 main drawback is its proximity to dusty roads and to the smoke 

 of the town. Its best features are excellent shelter — for reasons 

 before expressed, a remarkably deep alluvial soil overlying a 

 gravelly subsoil resting on chalk limestone, abundant mois- 

 ture, and a climate much to be envied by those of more north- 

 ern latitudes or farther from the sea. 



ISlany plants, only half-hardy elsewhere, even in the same 

 latitude, here exist perfectly in the open air. Especially notice- 

 able in the garden are the walls which, while giving shelter 

 from the prevailing winds, also serve in the conservation of 

 the rarer of half-hardy shrubs, such as the Loquat, Carob Bean, 

 Mutisia decurrens and the Chilian CoUetias ; Australian Blue 

 Gums, or Eucalypti ; the Japanese Wineberry (Rubus phosni- 

 colasius), "Winter's Bark" ([:)rimys Winter!) from Magellan, 

 and Wistaria from Japan ; Clematis alpina, a sort of shrubby 

 Anemone, from Austria ; Veronica Hulkeana from New Zea- 

 land and Berberidopsis coroUina from high up on the Chilian 

 Andes. Choisya ternata, Smilax latifolia, Zizyphus (Paliurus) 

 spina-Christi, Solanum crispum and Mahonia nepalensis also 

 do well here. Here and there also various interesting rock- 

 plants from the limestone or chalk, the granite from basal 

 Cambrian, or old red sandstone, are here grown in extempo- 

 rized niches or " pockets" especially prepared for them. You 

 may see the Pyrenean Ramondias so grown, also Edelweiss 

 from the Swiss Alps, and Androsaces, such as A. lanuginosa, 

 from the Himalayas. The last-named plant was first flowered 

 in this garden by Dr. Mackay in 1842. Dianthus, Linarias, 

 Erinus and Iris of many kinds are at home on these wall-tops, 

 and quite recently a special hollow plant- wall has been erected 

 for these and other denizens of the rocky places of the tem- 

 perate world. A small pond fed by the Dodder River is rich 

 in Aponogeton and Nympheeas, several of Monsieur Latour 

 Marliac's hybrid kinds having passed through the last winter 

 unscathed. The great Gunnera manicata, with leaves five to 

 seven feet across, is here quite at home, as also are the red 

 and green veined forms of G. scabra. 



The strong points of the garden are its large herbaceous bor- 

 ders, now gay with many summer flowers. It is also pre- 

 eminently a garden of hardy bulbous flowers of all sorts. 

 Snowdrops, Crocus, Narcissus, Tulips, Iris, Lilies of many 

 kinds ; and to see the Crocus or the Narcissi at their best here, 

 late in March or early in April, is a sight not readily to be for- 

 gotten. 



Overland in the Cayuga Country. — II. 



VERY beautiful is the neat and quiet road in this high coun- 

 try beyond Trumansburg. Visitors wlio now and then 

 come from some western state remark the absence of weeds 

 in tlie fields and along the road-sides of New York and New 

 England. Yes, weedy road-sides are rare in this Cayuga coun- 

 try. The sides have long since grown soft and smooth under 

 the lapse of time and the occasional plowing and grading. 

 The grass has crept over them in a hard and continuous sod, 

 and the farmers mow them as they do their meadows. Now 

 and then clumps of wild bushes have sprung up at will on the 

 corners or in the hollows, and so long as they do not interfere 

 with the roadway they are not disturbed. Although they may 

 not tell you so and may not even know it themselves, these 

 people have grown to love the copses and wood-lots for their 

 own sakes, for the labor of clearing has long ago been for- 

 gotten, and the passion to cut away every green thing has 

 passed away. How well I remember my early days in the 

 woods of Michigan ! Cutting and clearing and burning ! 

 These were the three merits of the pioneer, and it is little 

 wonder that he came to loolc upon every bush and tree as a 

 personal enemy. There was no quarter ; everything must be 

 swept from the land — every bush on the road-side, every tree 

 in the fields. And long after the farms had been cleared and 

 the roads had become settled and worn this passion remained. 

 But it is gradually burning out, and the next generation will 

 have forgotten it and will look with satisfaction upon the 

 clumps of trees and bushes that here and there spring up in 

 the waste places. The pioneer, and too often the lumber- 

 dealer, have no patience with any talk about forestry — this 

 science must find its chief inspiration in the older states. 



One thing more about these roads I must mention in pass- 

 ing : there is no rectangular road system in New York as tliere 

 is in most of the newer states. It is a blessing that this is so, 

 although there was a time when I looked upon section-lines 

 and quarter-section-lines as the fundamental desideratum in 

 road-building. But I no longer think of a hard-and-fast rec- 

 tangular road-system with pleasure. The " angling " roads are 

 commonly the most direct communication between neighbor- 

 ing villages, and if they follow the natural trend of the surface 

 as much as possible, they are always beautiful and interesting. 

 Rectangular roads would be the ruin of this fine country, for 

 to toil over hills and ride straight across the hollows and never 

 follow the creeks would be intolerable. Stretching out to the 

 south-west from Trumansburg is an old and well-traveled 

 ro;id which winds along the valleys to Watkins, at the head of 

 Seneca Lake. I have long told my students that a curved 

 drive is atti'active largely because it presents new views at 

 every point, but I never caught the full meaning of my own 

 teaching until I drove on this old turnpike. In many places 

 the curves follow each other so rapidly that the traveler is 

 constantly on the alert for new scenes, and these scenes are 

 all the more forcible when they strike one suddenly. But 

 when we came out upon a long straight portion of highway, 

 the feeling was wholly changed. The prospect pleased at first, 

 but it soon grew monotonous, and we fell into conversation. 



For ten mfles beyond Trumansburg there is little change in the 

 aspect of the country. We still keep within occasional view of 

 Cayuga Lake, and the hills are lower than they were a few 

 miles back. Near Farmer Village we find the first unmistak- 

 able evidence of the new life which is brightening the farms 

 of much of this lake region, for here we come .upon the Grape. 

 The Grape interest of western New York is very large and is 

 rapidly growing. The census of iSgo showed that the largest 

 vineyard area of native Grapes in America is the New York 

 region, including a strip of Pennsylvania lying along Lake 

 Erie. Some 51,000 acres were found to be devoted to vine- 

 yards in this region, and the product sold in 1890 as table 

 grapes was 60,687 tons. The heaviest Grape regions in New 

 York may be said to be four, those lying about Seneca and . 

 Keuka Lakes, in Chautauqua County, facing Lake Erie, and 

 along the Hudson. The Seneca Lake district, which is noted 

 for its Catawba vineyards, is now extending itself eastward in 

 this central and northern part of the divide toward Cayuga, 

 and it has even now reached this lake. Most of the Seneca 

 Grape district lies upon the west side of that lake and well 

 toward its southern end, but its eastern brancfi is now making 

 this broad expansion, the borders of which we have reached at 

 Farmer Village. The particular interest at this brisk hamlet 

 in a horticultural way centres in the Moore's Diamond White 

 Grape, which is here planted more largely than elsewhere. 

 One hundred acres of this variety were set in a solid block in 

 1891, and this spring fifty additional acres were planted along- 

 side. The hundred-acre plot is now planted to posts, and at a 

 distance it reminds one strongly of old burned tracts in the 

 Pine plains of Michigan, every bleaching-post suggesting the 

 stub of a tree. In all this great tract the ground is kept 

 scrupulously clean. It will be a test vineyard of this new 

 variety of Grape, and it will be watched with eager interest by 

 every grape-grower in the north. There are few White 

 Grapes which can assume to be market varieties, and there is 

 yet much doubt among the more conservative growers whether 

 a white grape will ever find an extensive sale. It is understood, 

 however, that the Diamond is to be a competitor of the 

 Niagara. It certainly has the merit of better quality, but its 

 virtues in the vineyard and on the road are yet largely to be 

 determined. It requires many years to learn the true merit of 

 any Grape, or of any other fruit, for that matter. The value 

 must be largely determined by the uniformity of its behavior 

 during a series of years. And yet nurserymen and others ask 

 the experiment stations for a report upon their fruits the very 

 year following the planting. 



Although this is a large vineyard, we shall find much larger 

 ones. This, like most of these very large vineyards set to a 

 single variety, belongs to a stock company. This concern is 

 known as the Boyer Diamond Vineyard Company. Like all 

 large enterprises, it is having a stimulating effect upon the 

 community, and private vineyards are now setting. These 

 new great vineyards are introducing many new problems into 

 the grape business of western New York, particularly as re- 

 gards hand-labor, which must be reduced to a minimum. The 

 first revolution which it is bound to introduce is in methods of 

 training. The training in common use on Seneca and Keuka 

 lakes is a species of renewal, by which the wood is renewed 

 each year back to the crown on the lowest wire. A cane is 

 trained out in each direction from the head on the lowest wire, 



