PART I. HORTICULTURE. 
ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS. 
Article I. — Description of a House for Forcing Vines 
in Pots. By Mr. Stafford, Gardener to Richard 
ArkwTight, Esq., of Willersley-Castle, near Cromford, 
Derbyshire. 
Gentlemen', 
As you requested to be furnished with my ideas on early forcing 
of Vines, I have sent you a rough sketch of a Vinery which I have often 
thought would be well adapted for growing early Grapes in pots : — from 
the very ill success I have always witnessed in this part of the kingdom, 
I have long been anxious to point out some permanent method to obtain 
this object, without risking the crop on the rafters or back walls, and 
should the method here described be adopted, I feel satisfied that both 
the plan, and the practice here attached to it, will be found to answer. 
The Plan itself will require but little explanation, being a very simple 
construction. The flues under the pit, will heat the air-chamber to a 
a very high degree, this heat should always be so applied as to act as a 
reserve, and be admitted into the house occasionally as may be required, 
through apertures in the back and front walls of the pit ; the same flue 
returns under the back walk, and likewise in the back wall; — and from 
having such a quantity of heated masonry, you may calculate upon a 
certainty with regard to the heat of your house, let the external air be 
what it may. I have so economised the heat of a house here, that I have 
often in the winter months had no fire for three weeks together, and have 
always had pine plants at the same time in the house. 
It will be unnecessary (and what I should by no means recommend) to 
fill the pit with bark during the time the vine pots stand in it, but they 
should be placed in rows in the pit, on the back curb and shelf, putting 
a feeder (or pan) under each pot, as the success will greatly depend on 
the proper application of water at the different periods of the season. 
In the front, it is intended to have vines to supply the rafters, which 
might be brought to vegetate some time before the pots were ready to 
remove ; and by planting them in the border in the front of the house, and 
with apertures to allow the outer air to enter under the partition marked 
on the plan, the vines will without difficulty remain torpid until May. — 
These are facts I have proved, in a house approaching in form very near 
to the one here mentioned. 
