EDIFICES USED IN HORTICULTUKE. 225 



principal articles of furniture should be the property of the proprietor of 

 the garden, and valued to the gardener on his entering on the situation, and 

 again valued on his leaving it ; he paying any difference in value which 

 may have been occasioned by use. This is not the general practice, though 

 it is fast spreading, and deservedly so, because it must occasion less pain to 

 a considerate master to part with a married servant imder such circumstances, 

 and less inconvenience to the gardener when he leaves his place, without 

 perhaps knowing where he shall find another. 



524. The journeyman gardener s lodge, and all the other edifices men- 

 tioned, are generally included in the sheds behind the diff'erent plant- 

 structures; because they tend to keep the latter warm, and because the 

 high back wall of the hothouses existing at any rate, they can be erected 

 there more economically than anywhere else. It has been observed, how- 

 ever, by a number of gardeners, both in England and Scotland, that living- 

 rooms at the back of liothouses are not healthy ; and that those that are 

 situated at the back of stoves are still more unhealthy than those at the 

 back of greenhouses, or other plant-structures where less heat is required. 

 Damp and want of ventilation are the probable causes ; for which reason we 

 should recommend the journeyman-gardener's rooms to be separated from 

 the back wall of the plant-house against which they are built by a vacuity, 

 communicating above and below with the open air. The floor should be 

 raised at least a foot above the general surface, and should have an ample 

 vacuity below it, which on the one side may communicate with the vacuity 

 between the walls, and on the other with the open a'w. This will ensure a 

 current of air through both these vacuities, which will be sufficient to carry 

 off" damp, and to prevent the ill effbcts of the excessive heat from the plant- 

 structure. Another point which ought to be attended to in the construction 

 of living-rooms behind hothouses is, to have larger windows and more of 

 them than is usual ; and always to have them carried up within a few 

 inches of the ceiling, in order that air may be admitted from the top as well 

 as from the bottom of the window. See note in the Appendix'. 



525. The fruit-room should have a double roof, or roof with a ceiling, a 

 liollow front wall, and double doors and windows, so as to maintain an 

 equable temperature. It should be divided into at least two apartments, 

 so completely separated from each other as to prevent the air of that in which 

 the early ripening fruits are placed from contaminating that in which the 

 late ripening sorts are deposited. Both apartments should be fitted up with 

 broad shelves of open work of white deal, or of some wood without resin or 

 other qualities that would give a flavour to tlie fruit ; and there ought to be 

 bins or portable boxes for preserving fruit packed in sand, fern, hay, bran, 

 kiln- dried straw, leaves or blossoms of the beech or chestnut, or other ma- 

 terials. The fronts of the shelves should have a narrow ledge, on which 

 temporary labels can be pasted, indicating the names of the fruits, and when 

 they ought to be fit for use, &c. Where fruit is to be frequently packed 

 for sending to a distance, there should be a third apartment for containing the 

 packing materials, and for packing in. Where there is danger from damp 

 or heat, the back wall and floor can have vacuities as in the journeyman's 

 room, with stoppers to the outlets, to be used in severe weather. 



526. The seed-room should adjoin the fruit-room at one end, and the 

 tool-house at tlie other. It should contain a cabinet fitted up with drawers 

 for seeds ; an open airy case, with drawers for bulbs ; shelves for catalogues. 



