Horticultural Implements, Appliances, etc. 255 



state J and as for the roads, the way they are watered cannot be 

 surpassed. They are kept agreeably moist without being muddy, 

 while firm and crisp as could be desired. Of course all this is 

 effected in the first instance by having the water laid on ; but that 

 is not all. With us, even where we have the water laid on, we too 

 often spend an immense amount of labour in distributing it. In 

 Paris generally it is applied with a solitary hose, which pours a 

 vigorous stream, divided and made coarse or fine either by turning 

 a cock, by the finger, or even by the force of the water. This is 

 of course the way they apply it to beds of shrubs, &c., that require 

 individual watering, so to speak, and it is also the way they water 

 the smaller bits of grass about the Louvre and other places ; but 

 when it comes to watering a large space of grass it is very different, 

 and then it is that their system is seen in all its excellence. One 

 day in passing by the racecourse at Longchamps I saw it carried out 

 in perfection. The space had become very much cut up by the 

 great review and the races. In any case they water it to keep it as 

 green as possible in summer. At first sight it would appear a diffi- 

 cult thing to water a racecourse, but two men were employed in 

 doing it effectually. Right across the whole open space from east 

 to west stretched an enormous hose of metal, but in joints of say 

 about six feet each. The whole was rendered flexible by these 



Fig. 76. 



portions being joined to each other by short strong bits of leathern 

 hose, each metal joint or pipe being supported upon two pairs of 

 little wheels. Fig. 76 shows a section of the apparatus at work. 

 By means of these the whole may be readily moved about without 

 the slightest injnry to the hose in any part. At about a yard or so 

 apart along this pipe jets of water came forth all in one direction, 

 and spread out so as to fully sprinkle the ground on one side ; and 



