xcviii 



ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



GENERAL MEETING-. 

 J. Bateman, Esq., F.R.S., in the Chair. 



The Rev. J. Dix read a list of the awards of the Floral Com- 

 mittee, and called special attention to a box of Camellia-flowers 

 sent from Her Majesty's garden at Osborne, with photographs of 

 the trees from which they were gathered. They were remarkable 

 as produced in the open air at so early a period in the season. 

 He also pointed out two fine specimens of Senecio QkiesbregMii, 

 which had done service at Battersea, and were now in full bloom. 



Mr. G. F. Wilson reported the awards of the Fruit Committee, 

 and highly commended the little self-coloured Gourd as a pretty 

 ornament for the dessert. 



Mr. Berkeley directed attention to Naudin's Memoir on Gourds, 

 in vol. vi. ser. 4, of the ' Annales des Sciences Naturelles,' as the 

 best source of information respecting the species and varieties. 



Mr. Jenner had sent to Chiswick a plant of the hybrid Thistle, 

 between Carduus palustris and C. heterophyllus, detected in Scot- 

 land. 



Some Peach-shoots from Lord "Winchelsea's were exhibited, 

 whose tips, and sometimes the middle of the shoots, were dead or 

 dying ; and Mr. Berkeley attributed the disease to copious moisture 

 following excessive drought. 



Diseased roots of the Telegraph Cucumber were then pointed 

 out, which were covered with Truffle-like excrescences, which, from 

 their peculiar structure, he believed to arise from a minute Vibrio, 

 probably identical with that which produces a similar disease in 

 Melons. 



The Pelargonium of which a notice is given in the Minutes of 

 the Scientific Committee, was also placed before the Meeting. 



The Chairman then made some observations on the collection 

 above mentioned of Camellia-flowers, on the propriety of again 

 trying Oralis crenata as a culinary plant, on the profusion of 

 Truffles in the past season in France, and then commented on the 

 different Orchids in the room. 



Mr. Berkeley stated that there are about forty species of Truffles 

 in England, and recommended those who wished to preserve the 

 full aroma of our chief esculent species {Tuber cestivum) to bake 

 it in wood-ashes, like potatoes. 



