March 24, 1897.] 



Garden and Forest. 



113 



trees were alive sixteen years later, and they had endured 

 some severe winters ; but this is a cold region, and they 

 were killed before they attained any stately proportions. 

 So did most of the trees at Geneste. The two survivors 

 were further from the lake and on higher ground than their 

 fellows. No Loblolly Pines at Geneste have been killed by 

 frost, and a beautiful specimen is living on the small island 

 in a brook hardly above the water-level. Fine specimens 

 of Liquidambar, Bald Cypress, Cedrus, many Oaks, Hicko- 

 ries and Tulip-trees add to the interest of the place, still 

 possessed by the granddaughter of Monsieur Ivoy. 



Michaux, as we have said, rather overrated the impor- 

 tance of the Long-leaved Pine for planting in France, and 

 his confidence that it could be grown under the same con- 

 ditions as the Pinaster and furnish superior and more 

 abundant products in the shape of timber and turpentine 

 was not justified. The Pinaster, or Maritime Pine, as it is 

 commonly called here, can be safely planted in the south- 

 west and west of France, where thousands of acres are 

 planted with pure forests of this tree, although there may 

 occur two or three winters in the century which will freeze 

 the tree in central France. The seed of the Pinaster is 

 abundant, cheap, and can be sown like grass on the heath, 

 and the young seedlings will make long shoots from the 

 first and quickly overtop other growth. The Pinaster also 

 gives prompt returns of wood and turpentine, and trees 

 twelve years old can be cut down to make posts for wine 

 galleries and will give rosin before they are twenty years 

 old, if planted far enough apart from each other. At thirty 

 years it furnishes a fair amount of timber of poor quality, 

 and at forty the tree is old. Again, the Pinaster is an excel- 

 lent tree to protect the coasts of the south-west against 

 sand-drifts, which formerly advanced from the sea until 

 they were successfully resisted by this tree. Compared 

 with this tree the less hardy Long-leaved Pine will flourish 

 in a more restricted area. It would require greater care 

 and much longer time to grow into merchantable timber. 

 According to Dr. Mohr,* it ought to stand until it is 

 from 90 to 140 years old. The trees at Geneste, although 

 sixty years old, are still practically valueless, while the 

 Pinaster would have paid twice the rent of the soil. Finally, 

 where there is no habitual and fairly large production of 

 any product, the disposition of it at a paying figure is 

 always difficult. Small copses or woods, small forests and 

 individual lots of trees seldom make a profitable specula- 

 tion. If there were a chance of growing any American 

 Pine in company with or in place of the Pinaster, the Lob- 

 lolly would be better than the Long-leaved Pine, as it 

 would, at thirty years, afford a greater quantity of timber 

 superior to that of the Pinaster, and which might possibly 

 find a market. 



The timber of the Long-leaved Pine imported into this 

 country has been largely used under the name of Pichepin, 

 an evident corruption of Pitch Pine. Struck by the beauty 

 of the wood, many planters in France have tried to 

 grow the tree that produces such fine timber. They have 

 sent to America for seeds of the Pitch Pine, but to the 

 seedsmen of New York and Philadelphia this meant the 

 seed of Pinus rigida, so that nine buyers out of ten have 

 received what they did not want. This confusion arises 

 from the similitude of the two words in different languages. 

 In France, as in America, Pinus rigida will give no timber 

 of the first quality and is good only for fuel. Its place is 

 in the sandy soils in districts too cold for the Pinaster, 

 where the rainfall is large or the water-table near the sur- 

 face. In rich soils it will grow to form picturesque speci- 

 mens for parks, but it is not of economical importance in 

 this country. 



Paris. 



Maurice L. de Vilmorin. 



The Pitch Pine is the most cheerful of our trees in early 

 spring. When seen on a distant hillside it harmonizes per- 

 fectly with the yellow sand and the March sunshine ; indeed, 

 it has an ingrained sunniness which gives the landscape just 

 the warmth it needs. — Tlwreau. 



'• The Southern Pirn. United Stales Department of Agriculture, Washington. 



Foreign Correspondence. 

 London Letter. 



English Orchards formed the subject of a lecture by 

 Mr. George Gordon, editor of The Gardeners' Magazine, 

 before the Society of Arts on March 3d. Mr. Gordon has 

 for years preached the gospel of English fruit, and last 

 year he sent a specialist to report on the condition of some 

 of the orchards in various parts of England, the result of 

 which he published. It revealed, on the whole, a deplora- 

 ble state of things, as deplorable as the condition of, for 

 instance, some departments of agriculture in this country. 

 The farmer will not grow wheat nor potatoes at a loss, nor 

 will the orchardist grow fruit which he cannot now sell 

 at a profit owing to foreign competition. It has been 

 shown again and again, by men who have tried, that such 

 products as apples and pears are bad business in England 

 unless one is specially favored. On the other hand, strange 

 though it may appear, it pays to grow these fruits for one's 

 own use ; it is only when one goes into the market with 

 his fruit that he finds himself undone by the foreign article. 

 After all, the middleman must live. As to the quality of 

 English-grown apples there can be no two opinions, ours 

 being first, and the rest nowhere. Cox's, Blenheim and 

 Ribston Pippins among the dessert kinds, and Bismarck, 

 Prince Albert, Lord Suffield and Echlinville among cooking 

 varieties, cannot be equaled by the best of imported fruits. 

 Mr. Gordon says that the hundreds of inferior varieties now 

 occupying our orchards should be burnt and replaced by 

 such sorts as those here named, and that apples worth from 

 ^'10 to ^"20 per ton are surely more profitable to grow than 

 those which will not realize more than from £\ to ^"5 a 

 ton. If orchardists saw any chance of obtaining these 

 better prices, no doubt they would hasten to follow Mr. 

 Gordon's advice. Englishmen, even when gardeners and 

 farmers, are not, as a rule, asleep to their own interests. 

 Mr. Gordon says we grow too many sorts. " Before we 

 can make our orchards profitable we must follow the ex- 

 ample of the American growers, and instead of planting 

 two or three trees each of a hundred varieties we must 

 plant a hundred trees each of a few varieties, and these of 

 the very best." 



Picea Omorica. — The Gardeners' Chronicle this week pub- 

 lishes a picture of a cone-bearing branch of this, the Servian 

 Spruce, which is represented by a group of healthy young 

 trees in the Kew Arboretum, raised from seeds obtained 

 from Belgrade about ten years ago. It promises to be a 

 good plant for England ; at any rate, the Kew plants are 

 exceptional, both as regards health and rate of growth, 

 compared with other Spruces, last year's shoots being from 

 a foot to eighteen inches long. The leaves are less than an 

 inch long, almost flat, instead of being quadrangular, as in 

 other Spruces, with two whitish lines on the upper side. 

 The cones, which are one and a half inches long, are pro- 

 duced in clusters, sessile on the stronger branches, or ter- 

 minal on the short lateral shoots. The tree is a native of 

 the mountains of Servia, Bosnia and Montenegro. In 

 stature it is said to equal an}' of the European Spruces. Its 

 nearest ally appears to be P. Ajanensis. — [Picea Omorica 

 was raised in 1881 in the Arnold Arboretum from seeds 

 sent by Dr. Bolle, of Berlin. It lias grown rapidly in 

 Massachusetts, where it is perfectly hardy and promises 

 to be a distinct and useful ornamental tree. — Ed.] 



Rhododendron pr/ecox is one of the greatest treasures we 

 possess as a shrub for beautifying the garden both inside 

 and out in early spring. The mildness of February this 

 year has specially favored it, and the scores of bushes of it 

 in the shrubberies and bods outside have been glorious 

 pictures of rosy mauve for the past fortnight. Nothing 

 could be more beautiful, and I would class it with For- 

 sythia suspensa. Magnolia conspicua, M. stellata and 

 Jasminum nudiflorum as a first-rate early-flowering hardy 

 shrub. It is, of course, as hard)' as (lie Alpine Rose, but a 

 snap of frost is apt to spoil its often too venturesome flow- 

 ers. Indoors it is almost equally valuable, for it forces 



