6S 



THE FI,ORTST AND POilOLOGIST. 



complete and enough brick-rubbish laid over the floor to cover the draining- 

 tiles, to lay some earthen drain-pipes parallel and close to the inside walls with 

 other tiles laid across and communicating with the mains at only 2 feet 

 npart, having four six-inch socket-pipes going up through the arches into the 

 mains on each side, so that when heat is wanted at the roots it can be passed 

 up the shafts, and when not wanted they can be closed, as can those for giving 

 heat and air for the houses. After this is done, the next thing is to cover the 

 whole with 8 inches of brick rubbish, burnt clay, or gravel. The borders 

 I shall make with plenty of old mortar, sand, and bone-dust mixed with the 

 loam, so that water can pass readily through and form a thorough drainage. 

 I hold that Vines, when growing, want a good quantitv of water and liquid 

 manure ; but, as soon as their fruit is ripe, the borders should be gradually 

 dried off and left to rest, to ripen their roots as well as their branches in a 

 wholesome soil, instead of the roots pushing as long as they can and then left 

 to perish in sour wet garbage, as is too frequently the case, drought being their 

 natural season of rest. This will be found to imitate their native climate, in 

 which there is wet for six months and very little rain for the other six, so we 

 can have as well one month in the year as in any other. It is only to start the 

 Vines at the proper time and dry them off when the crop is cut. If this plan 

 is carried out I am convinced there will be nothing more heard about bad 

 setting, shanking, bad colour, or mildew. All these things are brought about 

 by bad ventilation, cold, undrained borders, &c, &c. The growing of Peaches 

 and Nectarines, both forcing and in the open air, is only in its infancy ; yet I 

 believe that in twenty years' time there will be but few people foolish enough 

 to plant out in cold, ixndrained borders either Peaches, Nectarines, Apricots, 

 or Pears. What with the late frosts in spring and the early ones in autumn, 

 it is a most precarious chance that of a crop of any of these fruits. True, 

 sometimes fine crops are obtained, but in many parts of Great Britain this is 

 the exception. 



To build a wall 14 feet above ground with copings costs about £3 per yard 

 lineal, so that a kitchen garden 100 yards square, to build a wall round it. 

 would cost £1200, and this at 6 per cent, interest will be £72; then, with 

 coverings, nails, shreds, and labour to keep all in order will run away with 

 over £100 per annum. Now, on the average of years, where are the walls 

 that will repay this outlay ? In many gardens it is from five years with 

 Peaches to ten years with Pears before the trees are in a bearing state at all, 

 and I have known some sorts of Pears planted in cold soils twenty or thirty 

 years and never have borne a fruit. I therefore propose, after the walls are 

 built, to concrete about 3 or 4 inches thick with a mixture of lime and 

 gravel, sloping the border to the outer edge, then laying two main drains, one 

 close to the wall and the other parallel to it, on the edge of the border, with 

 cross-drains from back to front 2 feet apart, and with socket-pipes as shafts 

 down into the main drains, both back and front, at about 6 feet apart. Thus 

 it will be seen that a thorough ventilation will take place under the border. 

 The drains should be covered with 6 to 8 inches of brick rubbish, stones, 

 or gravel, to form, as in the houses, a thorough drainage. In the cold nights 

 and winter I would stop-up these shafts ; but when spring had fairly set in 

 and the trees in bloom, I should every morning, when the temperature of the 

 air was above that of the soil, open the shafts and shut them up at night when 

 it was cold. If this were watched all through the spring and summer, the 

 ■temperature of the earth might be raised many degrees, and we must bear in 

 mind that in our climate we never get the earth too hot for these fruits. I 

 should plant all my trees on Du Breuil's system, about 20 to 24 inches apart, 

 and trained to an angle of 50°. By this method the walls would be covered 



