CONTEMPORARY WRITINGS. 
287 
States, and as far as Montreal, in Canada, 
splendid orcliards of this fruit are to be seen. 
'Jlie peach is abundantly grown throughout 
the Union, but being mostly, if not always, 
raised from the stone, many worthless varie- 
ties are produced, and the better kinds are 
transient, as no trouble is taken to perpetuate 
good sorts by gi'afting, which, indeed, would 
not repay the labour of doing, from the short- 
lived nature of the tree in this climate, which 
comes into bearing in three or four years 
i'rom the kernel, and does not last above eight 
or ten before requiring to be renewed. The 
peaches of New Jersey are esteemed for their 
excellence ; but to the northward of that 
State, the summers are too short and cool for 
the perfect maturing of the fruit, and the 
trees themselves are apt to be injured by the 
rigour of the winter. The most northern 
station at which I remarked the peacii as 
a standard, small, indeed, but apparently 
healthy, was at Burlington in Vermont, (lat. 
44° 27') ; but the vicinity of Lake Champlain, 
on whose shores the town is situated, has a 
mitigating effect on the otherwise severe 
climate of that part of the Union ; for at 
Montreal, just one degree due north of Bur- 
lington, the peach has disappeared from the 
orchards, and sought the shelter of the gar- 
den-wall, being unable to resist the winter 
any longer as a 'standard fruit-tree. — Brome- 
Jield, in Hooker's Journal. 
Planting a Flower Garden. — A flower- 
garden should be and can be always well- 
stocked, let the season be what it may ; not 
indeed at all times with flowers, but at least 
with what produces as pleasing an effect. 
There are Aconites [Eranthis hiemaUs'], 
Christmas Roses [^Helleborus ni(ier'\, and 
Yiolet Grass \_Iono'psidiuvi acaule] for win- 
ter; Crocuses and their kindred species for 
the earliest spring ; Hyacinths, Anemones, 
Wallflowers, and all sorts of early Alpine 
plants, for the later spring ; a countless host 
of species ready to decorate the summer and 
autumn ; and as for the dead season of the 
year, when the flowers of autumn have all 
perished, and the first blooms of winter are 
still dormant, nothing is more easy than to 
occupy the ground with moveable evergreens 
of rich and painted foliage. Upon this plan 
all seasons have their peculiar features, and 
every month will bring a change — precisely 
what is wanted to render gardens the most 
agreeable. No rarities are needed for this, 
no tender strangers, whose cost would buy 
the fee simple of the land they grow in, 
nothing demanding shelter and peculiar skill. 
On the contrary, the commonest and most old- 
fashioned plants are as good as the last novelty 
from the antipodes, and for many purposes 
better. Not that the present favourites would 
have to be excluded ; on the contrary, their 
exquisite beauty and peculiar fitness for many 
of the purposes of embellishment will con- 
tinue to render them indispensable in aid of 
other things. They must always form a con- 
spicuous feature, because of their great in- 
trinsic merit ; but a feature only — a portion 
of the gay crowd, and not the crowd itself — 
Gardeners^ Chronicle. 
Treatment of NyjiPHiEA rubra. — The 
Nymph(sa rubra had been grown in the pine 
stove [at Eaton Hall] for many years, but 
never produced blossoms, owing, as I con- 
sidered, to its being too far from the glass, 
and the temperature of the pine-stove being 
generally too low for the development of its 
flowers. With this impression on my mind, 
in December, 1826, when its leaves were 
decayed, I took up the bulbs, or tubers, out 
of the stone cisterns in which they had grown 
for years, and put them into pots, according 
to the size of the tubers, and plunged the 
pots in water to within an inch of their rims. 
They remained in this situation in the pine- 
sjove till the plants began to show leaves in 
the April and May following. They were 
then planted in cisterns, and in glazed earthen- 
ware pots, in which was the following soils ; 
in the bottom, four inches of strong clay, 
made solid, above which was six inches of 
light mellow loam, and, at the top, an inch or 
two of sand, to keep the water clear. The 
cisterns, which are made of Yorksliire flags, 
and of the following dimensions, — three feet 
long, one foot eight inches broad, and one 
foot four inches deep, — were placed upon the 
end flues of pine-pits, where the fire enters 
and escapes : and they were elevated with 
bricks to within eight and twelve inches of 
the glass. The glazed pots were from four- 
teen inches to eighteen inches in breadth and 
depth, and were similarly placed, except a 
few that were plunged in corners of the melon- 
pits. They were kept constantly full of water, 
and it frequently was made to run over, in 
order that the water miglit be kept pure. The 
temperature of the pits was seldom under 80°, 
and in sunshine often above 100° of Fahr. 
No air was admitted at the lights immediately 
above the plants. As the plants increased in 
growth, they put out many runners, which 
were pinched oflT close to the tuber. When 
the roots reached the clay, the leaves got 
very strong, raising themselves on the sides 
of the cisterns. The Nymphcea cceridea and 
N. odorata, under similar treatment pro- 
duced abundance of flowers. The first flower 
of the W. rubra opened on the 13th of 
August, and measured over the disk five 
inches and a quarter. The same plant pro- 
duced another flower in September, some- 
what larger, and with nineteen petals ; and 
