lxiV PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Other Exhibits :— 



From Her Majesty's gardens at Windsor also came a box of 

 Cucumbers ' Frogmore Prolific,' and fruits of a new Tomato 

 ' Royal Windsor,' somewhat resembling 1 Blenheim Orange,' 

 which it was requested might be tried at Chiswick. Mr. Thomas 

 also sent three new Strawberries — 1. ' Sir Trevor Lawrence,' 

 a large conical wedge-shaped fruit, with a bright fresh flavour. 

 2. 1 Baron Schroder,' a roundish fruit of fine flavour, and very 

 dark colour. 3. ' Dr. Masters,' not unlike ' President ' in appear- 

 ance, but with a distinct pine flavour, though in the specimens 

 sent it was rather flat. 



With the above, also came a specimen of the ' Sarda ' Melon, 

 a variety obtained in Kabul by Dr. Aitchison, F.R.S., of H.M.'s 

 Bengal Army. Dr. Aitchison, speaking of it as grown in 

 Afghanistan, says ; ' Sarda keeps well and is exported to India 

 in great quantity during the winter, where it is much appreciated 

 by both Europeans and natives. Europeans in India and else- 

 where have tried to raise from seed the Sarda Melon. This has 

 always proved a failure, the fruit produced being of a very ordin- 

 ary form, and never having the flavour of the Afghan fruit. The 

 word Sarda means cold, and subsequently came to mean the last 

 fruits of the season left hanging on the trees when the main 

 crop had been collected. The Melon collected from the plants 

 that yield the Sarda whilst the season is hot, and there is no 

 frost, is, comparatively speaking, an ordinary good Melon, but 

 once the season is ending, and night frosts have set in, and the 

 plants are beginning to be nipped, the gardeners carefully cover 

 the fruit to prevent it from being injured by the frosts, and then 

 collect it when not quite ripe ; these fruits ripen very slowly, 

 will keep through the whole winter, and in flavour seem to 

 improve the longer they are kept. It is this treatment, I believe, 

 that constitutes the difference between the ordinary Melon and 

 the Sarda, and why gardeners out of Afghanistan and Persia 

 have not been able to produce the fine flavoured Peshawur 

 trade article, which, even in the old caravan, now railway, days 

 were carried in perfection to Southern India.' The fruit sent 

 was of a pale white-yellow colour and shaped like a Watermelon, 

 the flavour being conspicuous more by its absence than anything 

 else, and the texture was decidedly tough. Mr. Thomas said of 



