592 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



cheap at five shillings. Colonel Mackenzie has arranged thirty-six 

 species in ten " classes " of his own contriving, based upon characters 

 of the spur, leaves, and inflorescence. The sole professed object of this 

 scheme is to find out the name of any species with ease, which we 

 have not found to be achieved by it. The author's knowledge of the 

 plants may be gauged by his remark that " the only difference between " 

 Gymnadenia conopsea and Orchis pyramidalis is that " one has a sweet 

 smell, the other a nasty smell." Two concluding pages are devoted 

 to the " Meaning of Botanical Names," in which apijera is explained 

 as " L. ' Api,' a bee ; ' fera,' bearer," and conopsea, Morio, and other 

 by no means abstruse terms are left with a query. It is a pity that 

 Miss Ponsonby 's skill has not been employed upon a more complete and 

 really useful text. It is a common delusion that sound knowledge 

 can be obtained without taking pains. 



" Productive Orcharding : Modern Methods of Growing and Market- 

 ing Fruit." By Fred C. Sears, M.S. 8vo. 315 pp. (Lippincott, 

 Philadelphia and London, 1914.) 65. net. 



This work is one of a type which has now become frequent in 

 America, and deals with the whole subject of commercial fruit-growing 

 from the selection of the site up to the latest developments of marketing. 

 The last twenty years in England have seen many American practices 

 adopted in this country, and there is not, therefore, very much that 

 will be new to fruit-growers here, either in cultural methods or in the 

 combating of pests. 



The author opens with a discussion on the prospects of fruit 

 culture and the possibilities of over-production, and it is rather remark- 

 able to read that the production of apples in the United States has 

 progressively decHned since 1895. 



Under the discussion of soils some very valuable particulars are 

 quoted from H. J. Wilder as to the various types of soils best suited 

 for certain varieties of apples, and it is interesting to note that these 

 preferences are very largely based on mechanical differences, a point 

 which opens up some problems. Another factor of great importance 

 in the States is the question of temperature, but this seems to be 

 quite secondary in this case. Should these facts be well established, 

 they form an interesting commentary on the supposed influence of 

 certain stocks. 



A chapter is devoted to the question of interplanting with a view 

 to removal as the permanent trees require the whole ground, and it 

 seems that in the United States, as in this country, the chief difficulty 

 is for growers to bring themselves to the point of sacrificing profitable 

 trees for the benefit of the orchard in the long run, and the author 

 very strongly leans to vegetables rather than to bush fruits for this 

 purpose. 



A striking point in American commercial orchards is the absence 

 of grass beneath the trees for grazing, as is so commonly seen in this 

 country, and the whole tendency seems to be more and more for 



