so TOWN AND WINDOW GARDENING 



destruction of the green colouring matter, and structural 

 injury at the point where leaf meets stalk. Where is the 

 London flower-grower who has not watched these pro- 

 cesses with sad eyes ? When an ill wind blows soot- 

 laden fog towards Kew or Chelsea — places where so 

 many of our choicest plants and trees and flowers are 

 cherished — loud are the lamentations because of damage 

 done. 



Mr. Watson, assistant curator of the Royal Kew 

 Gardens, says he gathers up bushels of leaves in the palm- 

 houses every morning while a bad fog lasts, and after a 

 long spell of it many hard-wooded as well as the more 

 delicate plants are reduced to an unsightly condition of 

 almost bare stems, blotched and discoloured leaves, and 

 fallen foliage. Among certain groups even the soft stems 

 disarticulate at the nodes. 



Mr. W. Thiselton-Dye, Director of Kew Gardens, 

 describes the substance deposited on his glass-houses as a 

 solid brown paint, weighing about twenty-two pounds to 

 the acre, or six tons to the square mile. This makes our 

 fog enemy appear a very real thing indeed ; no wonder it 

 breaks plants down, and is the ruin of many fruit and 

 floral industries in the south of London. 



Are there any means by which town cultivators may 

 counteract these malign influences ? Only by very ex- 

 pensive appliances. The grower wants an air-tight green- 

 house, with definite openings where the admitted air can 

 be filtered. Filtering foggy air may counteract or even 

 keep out poison, but even then one has to make up for the 

 darkness. This can only be done by a generous installa- 

 tion of electric light. 



Horticulture thus carried on is extremely interesting 

 from a scientific point of view, but is not commercially 

 desirable, nor could the ordinary flower-grower afford it. 

 Fog-annihilators, and the use of chemicals in conservatories 

 have also been tried, the latter with very scant success. 



