Tlie Paris Sercage Irrigation at Gcnnevilliers. 127 
A alue equal to 40Z. per acre. Asparagus and potatoes grow also 
most luxuriantly and profitably. M. Tholomier took some 
old quarry-ground, measuring about 3^ acres, at a rental of 6Z. 
in all, from which he has obtained an annual produce exceeding 
160/. in value. 
Nursery- and flower-gardening are also carried on most success- 
fully at Gennevilliers under the sewage system. All visitors to 
Paris are pleasantly struck with the beautiful display of cut and 
pot flowers gracing numerous open-air markets and shops all over 
the French capital. In fact, the flower-trade is one of great 
and still growing importance ; and the area of land devoted to 
that beautiful culture is greatly extending every year in the 
immediate neighbourhood of Paris. Several well-known nur- 
serymen and flower-growers have recently established gardens at 
Gennevilliers, specially devoted to that industry under the sewage- 
system ; and nothing can give an idea of the peculiar and extra- 
ordinary brilliancy of colour and fragrance of perfume pertaining- 
to the various flowers grown from those sewage-irrigated beds. 
The growth of fruit-trees has also been attempted with won- 
derful success in point of rapidity of development in the trees, 
and the excellence and size of the fruit produced. 
Familiar as my English readers are with the good effects of 
the application of sewage in England, I doubt if they would be 
prepared to realise the wonderful results of that system under 
the Paris climate, and upon the sandy soil of the Gennevilliers 
plains, unless they saw it, and came to consider the local cir- 
cumstances which give to the application of sewage unusually 
favourable conditions. 
In the first place, the porous nature of the soil readily drains 
from the seed-bed the excess of moisture arising from an over- 
abundant flooding of sewage ; and, secondly, the large amount 
of caloric which readily accumulates in the gravelly subsoil from 
the exposure of the surface to the hot Paris sun during the 
summer season, acts as bottom heat ; and it is easy to imagine 
what energetic activity sewage-irrigation, under such climatic 
influences, must impart to vegetation. 
Already, as a natural consequence of the successful results, 
the rent-value of the land susceptible of being irrigated has 
risen considerably. Land which formerly could hardly com- 
mand 20s. an acre, is now readily let at GZ. 10s. The Munici- 
pality of Paris get now as much as 8Z. an acre for the land they 
possess in Gennevilliers, and the rate is still increasing. 
As another consequence of that prosperous state of the dis- 
trict, population is rapidly increasing, labour being in great 
demand, owing to the extensive market-gardens established 
upon every available spot of land within reach of the sewage. 
