276 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [October i, 1889- 
Out soil; on these lime soils it is most luxuriant, and 
has repeatedly continued to grow with me on walls 
and rocks when the earth-roots had been completely 
severed. The large-leaved African variety which I 
brought from Algeria, where I found it nourishing in 
the ravines in the sunshine, grows with marvellous 
vigour; in about eight years it entirely covered two 
sides of my old tower, 60 feet high, and I was obliged 
at last to destroy it, lest it should actually eat up 
the tower, the old mortar of which supplied it with 
sufficient nourishment to make it all but inde- 
pendent of its roots. I began by cutting it away up 
to the first story ; but this sharp practice did not seem 
to make much difference, it went on living and 
flourishing as a parasite; so I ruthlessly, but to my 
very great regret, destroyed it entirely. 
I do not meau to convey the idea that the value 
of manure is not fully recognised in the Mediterranean 
areas as a means of renovating exhausted soils, and 
of securing ami increasing cereal or other crops; indeed, 
manure is preserved, both animal and human, as 
preciously as in < hina. Except in large towns, fre- 
quented by strangers, there are no wasteful water- 
closets, and all that comes from the soil is conscientiously 
returned to it. In that respect, with all our vaunted 
civilisation, we are really behind the Mediterranean 
and Chinese peasantry, although it must be acknow- 
ledged that their mode of dealing with this source 
of agricultural riches is objectionable to our fastidious 
tastes. The disinfection by earth as taught by Moses, 
and by Mr. Muule — a Chinese missionary, I believe — 
is still all but unknown with us, although generally 
practised in the Mediterranean area, in a way. The 
practical fact is, that I am g! owing a number of plants 
in my lime-soil on the Riviera with marvellous success 
without any manure at all, and that they seem to get on 
without it as well as the Ivy. This fact may throw 
some light on the traditional Mediterranean agriculture, 
showing, as it does, that heat, sunshine, and water 
do more there than they do in the north to prevent 
and repair soil exhaustion. 
My garden consists of about 7 acres of rocks, 
precipices, terraces, all but overhauging the Medi- 
terranean, fully exposed to the southern sun, and 
protected by high mountains from the north-east and 
north-west. There is very little vegetable soil of any 
kind, and what there is, is principally composed of the 
break-up of the limestone rocks, under the influence 
of the sun, of the spring and autumn tropical rains, 
and of atmospheric influences generally. Although 
heavy rains fall in the spring and autumn — some 25 inches 
on an average, which is more than the average rain- 
fall of Middlesex or Surrey, as it falls tropically — that 
is rapidly, in shsets, mostly for a few hours only at 
a time ; and as it seldom rains at all from April until 
October, the climate, like that of Mexico, Australia, 
and the Cape, is a dry one. Water in such a locality 
is deficient, often absent. To remedy this deficiency, 
following the custom of the country, I have built for 
storage fourteen tanks or reservoirs. Moreover, I have 
bought for five hours a week, in summer, the privilege 
of using a permanent spring, which comes out of the 
rocks in a neighbouring ravine, and gives life to the 
village and territory of Grimaldi, in which I am located. 
This spring belongs, during nine months of the year, 
by medieval prescription, to the owners of some olive 
mills, where the peasant proprietors have their olives 
crushed and the oil extracted. During the three 
summer months, July, August, and September, the 
spring is divided in hours, every week, among the 
landowners, and is held by them as a property. Land 
being valueless for sale unless water goes with it, 
my neighbours took advantage of my ignorance of 
this fact to sell me land without the water, so 
I have had to purchase the water separately from 
others. The quantity which this spring gives me 
fcvery week — about 50 cubic metres or yards — in the 
summer, during the five hours each week, is quite 
insufficient for my wants; but the fact of my being 
:i co-proprietor gives me a hold on the spring during 
the winter months, if not wanted for the olive mills. 
I am the only one who waters after heavy rain in 
order to water the rocks, as I tell my neighbours; s 0 
I manage to repeatedly deluge the place and the ter- 
races and rocks during the winter, and to fill all my tanks, 
containing some 700 cubic metres, before the summer sea- 
son begins. Thus, on my system of deep watering, I am 
radically changing and fertilising the entire property, 
making an oasis of it. I may add, that I have had a lunri- 
nous irrigation idea. There is a high road between 
me and the sea, a steep ascent, which becomes a 
torrent-bed in heavy rains. I have obtained permission 
from the authorities to place a small dam on the 
gutter, which is on my side of the road, and carries 
the rain-water to the sea; as also to make a culvert 
under the boundary wall. By this means, when it 
rains heavily, I get a regular rivulet of water from 
the road into the lower part of the properity, an aban- 
doned quarry, which I am rapidly changing into a 
garden or forest of Cypresses. The lime-loving Cy- 
presses which I have plante^ there, in a mere rubble 
of loose stones, are growing like Asparagus : Cupressus 
excelsa, C. elegans, 0. argentea, O. Lambertiana, C. 
macrocarpa, C. peniula, and last, but not least, the 
lovely Pinus C. canadensis. I am very pr -ud of having 
thus introduced "a Nile," with its cataracts, and soil- 
loaded water into my quarry of stone rubble. Without 
this irrigation it would never have grown anything 
but Aloes and Agaves, and now it is fast becoming a 
small tropical forest, bidding fair to rivalise the old 
quarry of Latomia at Syracuse in Sicily: paroa com- 
ponere maynis ! I except to grow many plants there which 
do not succeed on the rock soil, and to enlarge the area 
of Rose culture, and that without manure. 
The Roses I named (May 4) as succeeding well were 
the Banksias, the Bengals, some Teas, such as Safran, 
Madame Falcot, Gloire de Dijon, Ohromatel, Marechal 
Niel, Fortune's Yellow, do perfectly without manure. 
Indeed, I never give them any at all, and they bloom 
luxuriantly every year, producing flowers fit for a flo- 
wer show. I have several Gloire de Dijon plants, ten 
or more years old, at the bottom of a half-sheltered 
moist rock, and also of a sun-exposed wall, which are 
covered every year with splendid blossoms in autumn 
and in spring, flowering indeed, but sparsely, all winter. 
These are grown in the lime soil without manure, 
never having had an ounce since they were planted. We 
merely renew the old wood occasionally by pruning 
out old woody stems, and letting new grow, which they 
do to a height of 10 or 12 feet. The flowers grow on 
the new shoots 3, 4, or 5 feet long, like garlauds, a 
very beautiful sight. Really the originator^ of the 
Gloire de Dijon ought to be made a baronet and have 
a pension for life. I believe that it is the most vigo- 
rously constitutioned Rose growing. It seems to suc- 
ceed everywhere in all climate?, and apparently in all 
weathers. I have seen it flourishing everywhere out- 
of-doors from the north of England to the Mediterra- 
nean. 
I have, I may mention, a large bed of Safrano, Fal- 
cot, Nabonnaud, and Bengals, some twelve years old ; 
about 30 feet long by 14 broad. The plants are all old 
plants, which have never had a handful of manure 
since they were planted. The soil is merely roughly 
dug up and left loose twice a year, in spring after they 
have flowered, and in autumn after their rest from 
heat before the rains. They flower magnificently twice 
a year in autumn and in spring. Just now the bed is 
a mass of bloom, all but concealing the foliage. In 
September, after their rest, my gardener prunes them 
down to about two or three feet from the ground, 
cutting into the one, two, or three years' wood, ac- 
cording to size and direction. The Banksias. single 
and double; the Fortune, yellow ; the General Lamarque, 
which all give iu spring a perfect river of branches 
and bloom, never receive an ounce of manure from 
year's end to year's end. The latter two are scarcely 
pruned. Under such circumstances it would really be 
a waste to manure, where manure is so costly and so 
difficult to obtain. 
I tried an experiment last autumn with a bed of 
three year Boubriuski,' a very sweet red Tea, which 
flowers all winter with us, and is much esteemed. 
One-third were left alone, the second third had their 
roots pruned all round, and manure added in the cir- 
cular trench made for that purpose. The other third 
