396 



Garden and Forest. 



[October io, i8 



and single Dahlias l.iy O. R. Kreinberg were well worth the 

 attention they received. 



The wild Howers collected by Allen Barr were well chosen, 

 but they lost some of their educational value liecause they 

 were not named. 



The Cattleya El Dorado, which is a Ijeautifid pinlv, was 

 thought by many retail florists to be one of the most desirable 

 for use in the arrangement of flowers. Pennock Bros, exhib- 

 ited a large urn and Heron & Nesbit a vase of cut flowers, 

 both of which received special premiums, and Miss Anna A. 

 Bisset won the first prize for a cross and wreath. Archibald 

 Lawson, gardener to H. H. Houston, Chestnut Hill, exhibited 

 some very handsome grapes, the clusters of White Nice, Santa 

 Cruz, Prince Albert and White Syrian being particularly fine. 



The attendance was only " fair." It is strange that an exhi- 

 bition as good as this should ever lack a generous attendance 

 in any of our large cities. But the cpiestion how to make 

 horticultural exhibitions meet expenses, is one that too many 

 of our oldest and best societies are still compelled to consider. 



H. H. Battles. 



Notes. 



Florida Persimmons are sold as a novelty by New York 

 fruiterers for 60 cts. a dozen. 



Autumn leaves from New Jersey thickets are tastefully com- 

 bined by NewYork florists, and sold by the dozen or the cluster. 



Dill and Fennel have never been brought in such quantities 

 to the New York markets as they have this season. There is 

 also an increased demand for Tarragon. 



Mr. William Court, well known to many American horti- 

 culturists as an agent of the Veitch Nurseries, died suddenly 

 of apoplexy, in London, on the 17th of last month. 



The finest Crawford Peaches are now coming from Balti- 

 more, where they have been kept back in cold storage-houses. 

 They sell for $4 a crate, and for 75 cts. and $1 a dozen. 



Mr. J. A. Lintner estimates tliat there are in the United States 

 1,000 species of insects which are injurious to fruits, and of 

 these 210 are known to live at the expense of the Apple-tree. 



For some reason trees and shrubs are later than usual in 

 assuming their autumn colors, but for a week past Bcrberis 

 T/ninbergii and. B. Sinensis have fairly glowed with tlie bright- 

 ness of their orange and scarlet. 



A Pearl River plantsnian is bleaching the tops of Russia 

 Turnips, which are a hot-house delicacy abroad, and which 

 are prepared for the table much the same as Sea-kale. These 

 and Cauliflower, also forced in hot-houses, will be in market 

 about Christmas. 



Professor James argues that it is quite as legitimate to ex- 

 pend Federal money to prevent the soil from flowing down 

 mountain sides and filling up rivers as it is to expend money 

 for clearing out their channels when once filled ; and that it 

 ought to be permissible to expend Federal mone}' to protect 

 tlie stream itself, if it be proper to stock and re-stock it with fish. 



Jtiglans Manchurica is a most promising nut tree from Japan. 

 A tree in the Arnold Arboretum, from seed planted in the fall 

 of 1879, has this year borne two bushels of nuts. The fruit is 

 larger, more nearly spherical and less rough than oiu" com- 

 mon butternut and is of very good flavor. The nuts are 

 borne in clusters with from six to tliirteen together. The tree 

 has borne now for five years, and, besides the valualjle crop 

 it yields, it gives good promise as an ornamental tree. 



The Tribune, of San Luis Obispo County, California, reports 

 some wonderful yields of Onions in the valley of tlie Arroyo 

 Grande. The product of one acre was weighed, and amounted 

 to 66,905 pounds, or more than thirtv-three tons. This would 

 be by measurement i,ig4j4 Ijushels. One of the Onions 

 measured seventeen inches in circumference. A Radish in 

 the same valley is said to have weighed thirteen pounds, 

 being twenty-one inches in girth and thirty-eight inches long. 



The report of Mr. J. H. Hart, the new superintendent of the 

 Trinidad Bc>tanic Garden, for the vear 1887, has appeared. This 

 is one of the richest, as it is the oldest, of the botanic gardens 

 in the British West Indies, having been continuously main- 

 tained during a period of seventy years. Its usefulness is 

 now likely to be greatly increased' under Mr. Hart's manage- 

 ment, which is first directed properly to the permanent es- 

 tablishment and arrangement of an herbarium, without which 

 no liotanic garden can be operated. The task is the more im- 

 portant as Trinidad possesses a flora of great variety, combin- 



ing West Indian and South American plants, besides many in- 

 digenous to the island. 



Experiments recently made by Prof. Scliubeler, a Norwe- 

 gian plant-geographer, confirm the belief that most plants 

 produce much larger and heavier seeds in high northern lati- 

 tudes than in those further south, the difference resulting 

 from the prolonged influence of light consequent upon the 

 length of the summer day at the far north. One of the most 

 remarkable instances he noted was that of Dwarf Beans, 

 which gained sixty per cent, in weight when taken from 

 Christiania to Drontheim, a distance of no more than four de- 

 grees ; and another was that of Thyme, which, taken from 

 Lyons to Drontheim, gained seventy-one per cent. All our 

 cereals likewise show a marked increase in weight when 

 grown at the far north. 



The new museum building of the Royal Botanical Garden 

 in Breslau, Germany, was recently opened. With its fittings it 

 cost al)0ut $50,000, and it contains, in addition to the large 

 rooms in which the collections are arranged, a library, a lec- 

 ture-room with seats for 100 persons, an apartment for the 

 Institute of Plant Physiology, another of a large size for micro- 

 scopical work, and a number of smaller ones devoted to dif- 

 ferent purposes. The collections include an herbarimn ; a 

 collection of woods, seeds, fruits, specimens prepared in alco- 

 hol, and pictures of the most useful exotic plants, so arranged 

 and catalogued that the general public may be interested and 

 instructed ; a colonial liotanical collection ; a phyto-palsonto- 

 logical collection ; and a collection of cryptogams. The 

 Director, Professor Engler, invites correspondence with a 

 view to the exchange of duplicates. 



Bulletin No. 2, just issued by the Forestry Division of the 

 Department of Agriculture, contains several interesting 

 papers grouped together under the general title of the 

 Forest Conditions of the Rocky Mountains. Some idea of the 

 depredations upon the National Forests, and the powerlessness 

 of government officials to prevent them, can be formed from 

 the extracts here given from Reports of the Commissioners of 

 the Land Office. Professor James writes of the relations of 

 the Government to the Forests, showing that there is abundant 

 precedent, if any were needed, to justify state and national 

 legislation for protecting our forests. The Report of Colonel 

 Ensign gives an account of the forests in the various states 

 and territories in the Rocky Mountain region. George B. Sud- 

 worth writes of the forest flora of the region, giving an arti- 

 ficial key to facilitate the identification of the principal species, 

 a work which would have been more useful if all the known 

 species had been included. The needs of the Y'ellowstone 

 Park are considered liy Dr. Arnold Hague, and Mr. 

 Abbot Kinney writes of tlie forests of some of the Southern 

 counties of California. A summary of legislation for the 

 preservation of timber or forests on the public domain 

 is given by Mr. N. H. Egleston. The eft'ect of the climate 

 of Colorado upon trees is discussed by Mr. George H. Parsons, 

 and Mr. Fernow writes of the formation and preservation 

 of snow slides and avalanches. 



Writing from Rome, in the Christian Register, Miss Augusta 

 Larned says : " One of the most beautiful of the old cloister 

 gardens is attached to the sumptuous church of St, Paul's 

 Outside the Walls. . . . The whole garden is filled with 

 Roses and sweet herbs. In the middle stand the old well and 

 the sun-dial, but everywhere the pink buds and blossoms are 

 turned towards the sun. The midday warmth brought the 

 odors of Lavender, Rosemary and Mint — scents all the bi'other- 

 hoods seem to love by instinct. Such depths upon, depths of 

 peace and quietude filled this monkish Rose-garden I felt I 

 could sit there for hours and muse on a skull without getting 

 too strong an odor of our mortality. For the glorious Italian 

 spring triumphed over death and decay. . . . The pret- 

 tiest monastic garden I have seen in Rome adjoins the church 

 of San Pietro in Vincoli, where the 'Moses' of Michael An- 

 gelo and the 'Saint Margaret' of Guercino are to be seen. 

 . . . The monastery is now turned into a school for en- 

 gineers ; but the polite attendant is always ready to open the 

 glass door and let you into a grassy nook planted with tall old 

 Orange trees, covered with the golden fruit, into which the 

 Bank'sia Rose has clambered with a perfect tempest of blos- 

 soms, while spring flowers and blooming shrubs fill it to over- 

 flowing, run riot over the paths, and paint themselves in vast 

 nosegays against the dark green and golden background. A 

 pair of rooks were fluttering in the shrubbery, the first I had 

 seen, and bright green lizards slipped away between the stones 

 of the old wall. The silence and freshness were indescribable; 

 and, as usual, the vanislied brotherhood had left a savor of 

 sweet, old-fashioned herbs behind them." 



