June 1.7, 1891.] 



Garden and Forest. 



285 



of gay flowers, they are well named " the hardy Orchids." 

 The flowers individually are not very lasting, but strong plants 

 produce many blooms, and the season extends over several 

 weeks, with a daily unfolding of new beauties. 

 Elizabeth, N.J. _ J.N.Gerard. 



Early Peas.— Another season's trial at this station satisfies us 

 that the green-skinned extra Early Peas of the Kentish Invicta 

 type are not only earlier, but more vigorous and productive 

 than the common extra early varieties of the Daniel O'Rourke 

 type. But neither type has high quality enough to make it 

 the best stock to work upon for improvement. In the mere 

 matter of earliness both excel, but we ought to develop an 

 extra early of fine table quality, vigorous habit and produc- 

 tiveness. Market buyers in the cities get few peas which 

 country people consider fit to eat, and growers could make 

 money by offering peas of high quality for discriminating 

 customers— at least those who sell their own peas to consum- 

 ers could. For home use wrinkled peas can be had for every 

 season, but the very earliest varieties of the Alpha type come 

 hard after the Daniel O'Rourkes. What we need is the 

 production of some well-flavored early sorts which will 

 bear with sufficient abundance to be profitable market sorts 

 and supersede the flavorless extra early peas which are now 

 universally sold. 



Raleigh, N. C. W - F - Massey. 



Alstromeria pelegrina.— Last year I noted the beauty of the 

 white form of this plant, which is also known as the Lily of the 

 Incas, though, of course, not a Lily at all, but one of the Ama- 

 ryllidaceiz. The white variety is beautiful certainly, but the 

 typical form is proving itself equally good, and much more 

 showy than its variety Alba. The color is a soft pink, with a 

 shade of green, and red lines. A small root imported last fall 

 has produced many flower-sprays, and they last well when cut. 

 This Alstromeria is not to be recommended for out-door plant- 

 ing, but as an in-door pot-plant. It is easily raised from seed, 

 as these germinate much more readily than those of other 

 kinds, but I have a suspicion that it depends not so much on 

 the species, whether the seeds germinate readily, as upon their 

 being recently gathered, for I know that in the seeds of the 

 same species in the hands of different persons there was a 

 great difference in the period between sowing and germination. 



South Lancaster, Mass. E. 0. Or pet. 



Grammattophyllum Measuresianum.— This plant is now flower- 

 ing, for the first time in America, I think, in the collection of 

 Mr. W. S. Kimball, of Rochester. It is a stately plant, with 

 enormous pseudo-bulbs and handsome, broad foliage ; it also 

 is very free in its habit of growth, and requires little attention. 

 On the plant at Rochester a spike, four feet high, carries forty- 

 five finely marked and well-developed blossoms. They are 

 light yellow, profusely spotted with chocolate. Basket culture, 

 with very little compost about its roots, a good supply of air 

 during its growing season, and a temperature of sixty-five 

 degrees will suit its requirements. At the great Temple Show 

 in London, held recently, this beautiful Orchid, exhibited by 

 Sander & Co., was universally admired and ranked among the 

 finest in the display. ,,,-,. , 



New York, A. DwMlOCR. 



Correspondence. 

 Fruit-trees on Lawns. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — There has grown up a canon that condemns the use of 

 fruit-trees on lawns, but there seems no sufficient reason why 

 the useful and beautiful should be divorced. A lawn with 

 fruit-trees alone may be made very attractive, although it 

 would be better to combine fruit and nut-bearing trees. 

 Apple-trees scattered about and grouped on lawns with Pear- 

 trees, Walnut, Butternut and Chestnut-trees may produce fine 

 effects. The lawn is too often a homeless place, lacking in the 

 hearty welcome that fruit-trees give us. I have a group of 

 Buffam Pears that stand thirty feet tall, and are much admired, 

 besides yielding me twenty bushels of fine fruit yearly. Other 

 Buffams stand about my lawn to relieve the uniformity of 

 round-headed and conical trees. This Pear is one of the best 

 of all upright-growing trees for lawns, giving not only novelty 

 of form, but fine foliage and color. But there are other Pear- 

 trees of singular grace and charm. The Anjou, for example, 

 makes a noble head. The advantages of lawns of this sort are 

 that many who cannot afford to assign ground for lawns with 

 ornamental trees will do so for those that return a profit. The 



only serious disadvantage is the possibility that by fruit-gath- 

 ering some damage may be done to the foliage or important 

 limbs broken, but with proper care there need be no such 

 danger. 



Plums do not make good trees for the lawn, as a rule, because 

 they are short-lived, and are liable to be misshapen by the 

 necessary cutting that removes black knot. But there are few 

 handsomer trees than Cherries, either Murillo or Heart. But 

 my preference has been to grow them mostly in shrubberies 

 or on the edge of the lawns. The Persimmon forms a good 

 crown, and adds to the number of good lawn fruit-trees. It is 

 hardy with me in central New York, although I do not know 

 of any trees hereabout except my own. 



I agree with Henry Ward Beecher that America furnishes 

 no sight more beautiful in all its blossoming flora than an 

 Apple-tree in full bloom. The variety in shade and in form of 

 petals is remarkable. I have before my window a Kirkland 

 Apple-tree and a York Pippin. The blossoms of the former 

 are massed like a huge snowball. The petals are long and 

 twisted and star-like ; those of the latter are broad, and held 

 up like a saucer. The Japanese worship the Plum and Cherry- 

 blossoms, and in our shrubberies we have nothing finer than 

 Wild Cherries, and Wild Plums and Crab-apples, in addition 

 to our cultivated Cherries and Plums. The finest group that 

 I have had this spring consists of Governor Wood Cherry- 

 trees, bordered with Late Montmorencies. 



Clinton, N. Y. E. P. Powell, 



[We are not aware of the existence, in treatises of land- 

 scape design, of any such canon as that laid down by our 

 correspondent, and if fruit-trees are seldom used in pleasure- 

 grounds it is probably because there are some good rea- 

 sons against the practice. There are cases in which these 

 trees could be satisfactorily planted on grounds about 

 houses — about a farm-house, for example, with surround- 

 ings of orchards and meadows and cultivated fields. The 

 question is one of details and particulars, and no rule of 

 universal application can be laid down. If by a lawn is to 

 be understood a slightly undulating body of turf with 

 foliage so disposed about it as to make the most pleasing 

 sylvan composition, and especially to introduce an element 

 of obscurity and indefiniteness in its outlines, we should 

 select the trees best suited to produce that effect, and«it is 

 difficult to see why fruit and nut-trees should be preferred 

 to other forms of foliage, or how they could be mixed with 

 other forms of foliage with any gain in respect to harmony 

 or agreeable contrast. Further than this, fruit-trees, as a 

 rule, are apt to take a formal shape, especially if they are 

 pruned and managed with reference to the production of the 

 greatest amount of fruit, Again, nearly all of them are 

 more subject to be injured in appearance by fungi or in- 

 sects than are those trees usually preferred for lawns. The 

 beauty of the bloom of a Cherry-tree is evanescent, and 

 when not in bloom a mature tree is usually very stiff and 

 unsympathetic in its form when mingled with other trees, 

 or it suffers from some disfigurement. Its beauty during 

 the short flowering period does not compensate for what 

 would be lost in substituting a Cherry for some other tree 

 which is more desirable throughout the year. Besides this, 

 fruit-trees, as a rule, have little beauty in the autumn. The 

 Cherry turns slightly, and so do some of the Pears which 

 contain the blood of the Chinese Sand Pear, but, as a rule, 

 fruit-trees lack the beauty of our native trees in autumn, 

 and it is very desirable in lawn-planting to take advantage 

 of the beauties of autumn coloring. — Ed.] 



A Neglected Evening Primrose. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — There is a glowing California field-flower that pos- 

 sesses many charms, and well deserves introduction to the 

 garden. In its season this lovely Cahfornian (Enothera, with 

 its dwarf growth and its compact clusters of golden bloom, 

 appears as distinct and as striking a feature of the landscape 

 as the great flame-red Eschscholtzias. One can almost claim 

 that, when the Wild Poppy became the state flower, the modest 

 merits of this perennial Evening Primrose were sadly neglected. 



The other day — it was May ioth — I walked up the long sea- 

 ward slopes of Berkeley. Every vacant lot and the very streets 

 were golden with little plats of shining blossoms. I began to 



