February 26, 1898. 



GARDENERS' MAGAZINE, 



LEAVES FROM A RAM 



N 



TRUE GARDENERS. 



Gardeners spring up like mushrooms and you meet with them every- 

 where. In the sense of which I speak of gardeners I do not necessarily 

 refer alone to men who follow the gentle art as a means of obtaining a 

 livelihood, though they are numerous enough, but rather would I include 

 all who have a natural bent for horticulture. Here we have a wide field 

 before us, for true gardeners are to be found among all sorts and condi- 

 tions of men. Commence high, if you like, among dukes, lords, and 

 baronets, and familiar names rise spontaneously to the lips — names so 

 well known that there is no need to mention them here, and the owners 

 of them are gardeners in the truest sense, because they are endowed with 

 an ardent love for Nature and her capricious workings. Then turn to the 

 professions— the Church, the law, and medicine, and you will find 

 gardeners. Some of them famous in the annals of horticulture, and 

 others following their bent in obscurity so far as the world is concerned, 

 vet obtaining that enjoyment out of the occupation that only a true 

 gardener can. Come lower still, among the working ranks of our great 

 population, and here you find gardeners on every hand. Some are clerks, 

 others artizans, others again labourers, and, in fact, comprising all walks 

 of life that demand the exercise of brain or the energy of muscle ; yet 

 they are all gardeners, because Nature made them such, and endowed 

 them with the happy faculty for obtaining pleasure and recreation in 

 studying the gentle art that refreshes wearied brains and makes a 



I27 



or did eighteen months ago-in anything but an aristocratic part of the 



£X iS^t £ ?eaP ° rt ° f Ca , rdiff Hod ^ e ' s Yard > Bute Do <*s, doe not 

 strike one as being a very salubrious spot, and the name is by no means 



^^W 0 *^ 0 ^^ it is the last place in which ^ne would 



duster y ^T^Y ,° f findin S a gardenen Hod ^ e ' s Yard * a 



™ ' r ' °! h l ,tde old-fashioned tenements, that probably existed before 

 many of the fine buildings of which Cardiff boasts were thought of. The 

 houses, in fact, by their appearance and situation, might have been 

 washed up there by the tide, and, having found natural moorings, allowed 

 to remain The murky waters of the docks come nearly up to the doors, 

 and great baulks of timber and barges of coal, iron, and other merchan- 

 dise appear tc be the only craft that find their way up to the coal sidings, 

 timber yards, and warehouses. On a summer day the aroma from the half 

 stagnant water is not the most pleasant, and the whole surroundings give 

 you the idea of prosperity in one respect, and hard, ceaseless toil, with 

 meagre house accommodation in another. Yet here, under circumstances 

 that many a professional gardener would consider impossible, a man rode 

 bis favourite hobby with a success that would have attracted much notice 

 had the conditions been of the most favourable character. 



I made the acquaintance of the man, whose name slips my memory, 

 in one of the tents at the Cardiff summer show. From his appearance 

 he might have been anything from a ship's stoker upwards, though I 

 learnt afterwards that he followed the calling of a shoemaker. It was 

 evident the man was in trouble, as he looked in a half-interested manner 

 at a group of specimen fuchsias, and the cause of his discomfiture was 



pleasant change for those whose main occupation is monotonous and t ha ffi " w £ s ^ ^h™»e^n* .™n ms discomhture was 



uninteresting. ^ a ™«* ia J ™?er in a small way and a prize-winner at 



Perhaps we are to bhme for putting such a narrow limit to this world 

 of horticulture, as in the sense that the word is generally understood 

 gardeners are only men to whom gardening is a means of living. All 

 others are classed under the pet name " Amateurs," though they comprise 

 many to whom the appellation, as it is understood, does not apply. In 

 cricket a professional is a man who receives payment for playing, and an 

 amateur is a man who does not. In horticulture the amateur is 

 frequently understood to be only a novice who dabbles a little in gardening 

 for a hobby, and plays at it, so to speak, but surely this is a wrong con- 

 sttuction to put upon a community. There are many, of course, to whom 

 the word in this sense justly applies ; but on the other hand, there are 

 many more who are amateurs correctly speaking, because they receive 

 no financial remuneration from horticulture, but apart from that they are 

 irueners true gardeners, thoroughly understanding the branch they 

 toiiow, and often able to teach something to men of the professional 

 ~f • V ven among the working population such men are to be found, 



ThtT ?u l e u- T y V '!! age y° u wiI1 find a section of thorough gardeners! 

 nese : are the shining lights of the little horticultural world in which they 



If" e look fd upon as authorities. Their allotments and gardens 



show IS a - 1 t0 ^ em ' and in health y competition at the village 



heToet y heL W , eaCh ? thCr f ° r the C0V6ted awards ' Gardening is 

 div'swork vT' and m the ?£ nng and summer seasons, after a hard 

 Zetv 1'/ ma y me L et Wlth them-a kind of mutual improvement 



« mat 1 KJ ng v aCh ° ther ' S Tf 0rk ' and crit icising or approving, as the 

 so K C- \°\ C£m , Cal1 Such men amateurs if you like ; but 



gardeners wh.T u r0ad Se , nse of the word that also includes them as 

 gardeners who know how work should be done and take a pride in doing it. 



thes E eren 0 pur S 7e°tW q rnL n K ed ^ the difficulties und *r which some of 

 last summer 1 f hobbies and, as an instance of this, it was my lot 



able boTed 1 affl^ • bl L nd & ardener «. Il was a sad case-a strong, 

 dent whic fflKtK*? ^ ? f Hfe thr ° Ugh a Rentable acc£ 

 after that in mo^ ™ *l 8 ' °J h ' S eyCS ' Life was dark to him 

 seemed nothTn J to If and ' without the facult y of si g ht > there 



nieans; a nd hifstore nf \ , WaS °. nly a labourer ' with labourer's 

 words hfe seemed a h knowledge was therefore small. To use his own 

 some-hina ™ ™ . a b , Urden ' and a sightless existence unbearable. 



• — * ■ * J J « «™ W » »• M. M « |V Hill \^ ± ^ 



previous shows, but on this occasion schedule regulations prohibited him 

 from showing on account of his plants being in too large pots. Expres- 

 sions of sympathy led to an invitation to pay a visit to Hodge's Yard, and 

 it was not without difficulty that the establishment of my newly-made 

 acquaintance was found. The policemen did not seem to know the exact 

 spot, as Bute Docks covers a wide area, and in Cardiff Hodge's Yard is 

 not so well known as Piccadilly is in London. The fuchsia grower, how- 

 ever, was not without a reputation in his own locality, for on meeting a 

 passer-by, and mentioning the name of the man whom I was 

 looking for, he said, "Do you mean the man who grows fuchsias?" 

 On receiving a reply in the affirmative, he kindly volunteered to act as 

 guide, and short cuts through labyrinths of narrow streets and by dan- 

 gerous-looking dock cuttings led us to the yard. The appearance of a 

 stranger seemed to excite interest, for groups of grimy-looking youngsters 

 stopped their play and stared as we passed, and then by mutual consent 

 followed in a body, evidently thinking that something exciting was going 

 to take place. Women, too, seemed no less interested, as heads and 

 shoulders appeared at the low doorways, and then retreated or moved a 

 yard or two lower down for an exchange of opinion with the next door 

 neighbour as to the curious phenomenon of a stranger by his presence 

 disturbing the peace of Hodge's Yard. 



Then 



In the little square of garden which lay in front of the shoemaker's 

 establishment was the greenhouse. It was a curious piece of architecture 

 of various elevations, and appeared to be an ingenious mixture of 

 window frames, and garden lights transformed into a greenhouse. There 

 was no doubt about it being home-made, and apparently the irregularity 

 in outline was due to the addition of wings to the first structure. A 

 couple of downward steps led to the doorway, which was made to be 

 entered in a stooping posture, but once inside there could be nothing 

 but admiration for the contents. There, in that primitive greenhouse 

 and amid the most ungenial surroundings, were specimen fuchsias worth 

 going a long way to see — plants seven and eight feet high, pyramidal in 

 form and clothed from base to apex with healthy foliage and a wealth of 

 handsome flowers. They would have elicited expressions of admiration 

 at a Temple show — yet grown by a mender of boots and shoes. On 

 shelves near to the glass were zonal pelargoniums in pots staked out 

 as specimens, and trained in the most orthodox manner. To examine 

 these closely it was necessary to climb up a step-ladder and look at them 

 from the outside. There was a family interest in the greenhouse, as the 



n »s sense of tourh \m^' T ? * . . wnen S1 g™ tailed 



P°*er of to£^ P ^^^ h hls . , bhnd or bs were useless, his 



•ome'hin? nm, "r^"' ai,u a "gnuess existence unbearable. T 



twenty rod ni t • rescue, and that something was his garden— a - - j ... w.v. e . VMU . vw «, ..^ 



his sense oft 'k *° allotmen t field. He found that when sight failed shoemaker's wife, in the absence of her better half, told how they had 



oi tourh ^ mn m r ~J — j 5 raised, grown and tended the plants, while two or three of the iuvenile 



members were busy on their hands and knees watering the fuchsias. 

 They had won honours, too, and it was with pride that the good woman 

 displayed the medal awarded by the Cardiff Horticultural Society. It 

 would serve no purpose to detail the methods of cultivation as given by 

 the shoemaker's wife, but the splendid appearance of the plants was 

 evidence that it was correct. " He spends most of his spare time with 



before 



increased, and wJlA*A * nese powers of touch and imagination gradually 



Dlot u_ p ° n > Dut his friend, his companion, and chief solace. The 



ueen a credit to any man, but to one without sight it was 



•ouch more. It wac „ *V*' "'""> " Ul w " 11C wunoui signt it was 



P« rf ectly straight * n A J£2Fi*2&? and neat ness, every line being 

 J- « to watch tL patience if J3f5 th • ^ Int eresting, yet painfu? 

 *m his line for thl ™ f S¥ man in , measuri ng the distances, and 

 e v no "gh to tire anyone v ? : t ^ h e t'mes he went over the ground were . . 



Not a weed was tn V th him Jt appeared to be a labour of love the con clusion was foregone. 

 find 'ng the obnovl,?.,, seen >.yet the blind gardener's only means of and worthy of encouragement. 



'em," she said, "and I help him.'"' 



I did not attempt to gather the amount of pleasure this shoemaker 

 obtained from his hobby, as, judging from the interest showed byihis wife, 

 the conclusion was foregone. At any rate, such -a man is a true gardener 



ran 



— wic IIO e between W ' ' 7 •' — uustaiuu These are but two solitary instances where horticulture brings 



•ccuracy that would haw K r ° WS , S rowm & vegetables with remarkable pleasure to those whose lot is not cast in the easiest walks of life. There 



SSI 1 "* off the plants in a ■ n t0 manv who have a knack of is no need to go out to the highways and hedges to find many more. They 



d m» ^ s operation. Standing at one end of the are here in the midst of us, and daily we are brought into contact with 



men of all classes who are real gardeners because Nature has made them 



fc™-":"^ potatos due an*T«u T cw W11C " U » W «8 C3 snouid be cut, peas such; and one asks, Why do so many miss theiri vocations ? for would not 



HI d ^tailed the lahn,,, u a J f rest of 11 as wdl as any professional, such men ornament the calling better than many who are really in the 



towards th» k ld -°°ur he had with watering. anH. t„m;^r, U. s H 



allotm 

 doin 



d0,n g well or mkJ. . • e exact Position of every crop 

 ffthered, p£S^. , He K new when cabbages *t 



, and whether it was 



£f d «n bef 0l , 

 >»» hand 



US m*» 



bre eze, prophesied rain 



ranks ? 



pleas 



Anoth 



* - — - w * * ^ » w • 



r ^dividual, whom I shall class as a true gardener, resides 



New Potato, Carter's Snowball.— Carter's Snowball is one of the best 



new potatos that has come under my notice for some years past ; it is a good 

 cropper, and has first-class cooking properties ; it does not produce of much haulm 

 as some varieties, but the tubers are quite large enough, nearly round, and very 

 handsome. — John A PL IN, Hasfield Court. 



