(>(iH .loUKNAL OF THE UOYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, 



destructive to any plants growing beneath, more destructive than the 

 rain drip from any other tree would ho, and thai it bus boon particularly 

 noticeable thin year. Ho can, however, see no reason why it should bo 

 ho, and asks "Is tboro anything in tbo Limo particularly, of all troos, 

 fcO Injur* anything growing below it ? " On inquiry wo bavo found that 

 his inforinanl is by no moans alone in attributing deadly consequences 

 to the vicinity of a Lime-tree; on the contrary, u belief i 1 1 its ill olVocts 

 is very widespread indeed, Put we believe it is absolutely erroneous to 

 fasten the blame upon the free. The Lime, as everybody knows, is 

 peculiarly subject to attacks of aphidos, which excrete a sweet sticky 

 .substance, which in hot seasons is so abundant that it drips from the 

 trees on to any growth below, injures it by sealing up its respiration 

 pores, and causes all tbo dust and dirt of the atmosphere to accumulate 

 upon it. The past summer has, however, not been by any moans a hot 

 one, and has consequently boon comparatively free from aphis, and beyond 

 this aphis-drip (which is absolutely distinct from rain-drip) tboro is 

 nothing in a Lime-tree to injure anything below it more than in any 

 other kind of free. 



It will further bo obvious that the more frequently it rains the more 

 it will wash oil' tbo aphis-drip deposit, and cleanse the leaves of plants 

 below, and in this way tl»o rain-drip will do actual good instead of harm. 



To MAK10 PoiMMKH LAST IN WATER. 



A correspondent who is enthusiastic over Shirley Poppies tells us 

 that she has overcome their most serious defect, which consists in the 

 diflieulty of so treating them as to gel them to hist fresh in water instead 

 of drooping their heads within an hour or two of being gathered. She 

 says : " I always cut my Poppies early, say H.JH) A.M., and I take out with 

 mo into the garden a jug half full of boiling water, and put the llowor- 

 stoms into it. and leave thorn in the jug quite half an hour before arrang- 

 ing them in vases tilled with warm water. They will then last, with stitV 

 and upright stems, for two days, without either loaves or blossoms droop- 

 ing. I found putting them info cold water was of little use, but since I 

 Started with boiling or almost boiling water I have never failed." This 

 did not reac h us till after the Poppy season was over, so that we have not 

 OUnolvdS t ried it. 



Pruning Applb-trbbb, 



A Fallow asks how it is that his bush trees of 4 Irish Poach ' and 

 * Yorkshire Beauty' never bear even a moderate crop of fruit. He says 

 that all his trees are pruned on the same system, and yet that theso two 

 varieties may be classed as absolute failures. 



The practice of pruning all Varieties in the lame way is surely the 

 very cause and reason of the failure? Many varieties of Apples have a 



peculiar habit quite different from their brethren, and therefore require 



a different stylo of pruning : such varieties, for instance, as • Irish Poach ' 

 and its seedling, 1 Early Peach,' 'Yorkshire Beauty,' ' Mr. Gladstone,' 

 4 Lady Sudeley,' and a few others. All those varieties form fruit-buds at 

 the points of the current year's shoots, and to prune off all the points 



