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PAPERS AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
produce of early and late sorts of Pears, in the 
climate of Scotland, the benefit is great. By 
having the branches of Pear trees, alternately, 
one early the other late, there are as it were 
two chances of success ; the Jargonelle being 
veiy early in blossom, if that fails in conse- 
quence of unfavourable weather, the late sort 
flowering at another time may succeed. An- 
other advantage arises from the crop coming 
in at different seasons. The Jargonelle ripens 
off before much effort is required from the 
tree to support the late sort, so that the tree 
is more capable of supplying nourishment to 
half a crop of Jargonelles, than if the crop 
were all of that sort ; and as the early Pears 
are all gathered before the late sort begins to 
swell to size, the tree is at once relieved from 
half its crop, and in that case more enabled to 
mature in greater perfection its late produce. 
My experience in the practice enables me to 
state that the trees produce finer fruit in this 
way than if they were all of one sort. — Letter 
by Mr. D. Montgomery. 
[It is the practice in Scotland to grow several 
varieties of Pears on the same tree against 
walls. The necessity, caused by the climate, 
of training most of the Pears on warm expo- 
sures, has induced the adoption of this economy 
of wall room. It is however worthy of imita- 
tion in private gardens in England ; for as 
few families can consume the entire produce 
of a full-sized well managed Pear tree of any 
one kind, much waste would be avoided, as 
well as more variety for the table secured, if 
every tree on a wall were worked with two or 
more kinds. "We have successfully worked five 
sorts on a Jargonelle tree cut back on pur- 
pose, and nothing could do better; all we had to 
do was to use the knife freely to the Jargonelle, 
which wanted to supersede the others.] 
The Alpine Strawberry. — I possess two 
seminal varieties, which are rather larger and 
sweeter than alpine strawberries in general ; 
from these I take runners in August or Sep- 
tember, and plant a bed near to the garden 
pump, or pond. By the following spring the 
bed will be well stocked with plants, and early 
in the month of May, when they are in full 
flower, I cut away all the blossoms, pi'eserving 
the leaves uninjured ; this is again repeated at 
the end of the month. Towards the middle 
or end of June more blossoms appear, and the 
plants afford flowers and fruit all the latter 
part of the summer, and till cut off by the 
autumnal frosts. If the first blossoms were 
not removed, the principal crop of Alpines 
would be ripe at the time the larger straw- 
berries are in season, and consequently of 
little worth ; but by this mode of culture, 
they come into bearing in the latter part of 
the summer, just at the time the other kinds 
are over. — Letter by J. Williams, Esq. 
[We prefer sowing the seed, and hoeing 
them out like turnips, for they grow best when 
close together ; and without any other culture 
than keeping them clear of weeds, they bloom 
and bear from May till the frost kills them, 
and we have known this to be at Christmas. 
They do not require water if they are in rich 
ground and close together, for their own 
foliage appears to protect them.] 
Management of Fruit Trees in Pots. 
— I have more than once mentioned the im- 
portance of giving to fruit trees, from which 
a crop of fruit is required very early in the 
season, a high degree of excitability, or the 
power to vegetate very strongly in moderately 
low temperature, at the period -when they are 
first subjected to artificial heat : and I have 
pointed out the advantages of 'retaining all 
trees which are intended to afford such very 
early crops in pots. I have endeavoured to 
ascertain within how short a period, in the 
ordinary temperature of my pine stove, plants 
of the Chasselas and Verdelho vine could be 
made to yield mature fruit. The subjects of 
this experiment had produced a crop of fruit 
previously to midsummer, and in the follow- 
ing month of July, they had been taken from 
the stove, after having been for some time 
sparingly supplied with water, and placed 
under a north wall ; in which situation they 
remained nearly torpid till autumn, when they 
were pruned. Early in the winter, I observed 
in them strong symptoms of a disposition to 
vegetate, though they remained in the cold 
and shaded situation in which they were first 
placed, when removed from the stove : and on 
the 12th of January I found the buds so much 
swollen, that I feared the exposure to frost 
would prove fatal to them ; and the pots were 
consequently removed to the stove. In this, 
the sudden increase of temperature occasioned 
every visible bud to unfold itself within a very 
few days; and on the 17th of the following 
month, being thirty-six days after the pots 
were brought into the stove, the berries of 
some bunches of the Verdelho grape were so 
far grown, that I could have thinned them 
with advantage. In the end of March the 
Chasselas grapes became soft and transpa- 
rent, and in the middle of April some bunches 
were as mature, and much more yellow, than 
those of the same kind usually are when first 
brought to the London market in the spring ; 
though the weather had been, during the 
earlier part of the spring, dark and cloudy, 
and consequently unfavourable. The wood 
of these vines appeared nearly mature in the 
end of April, and by removing them from the 
stove for a short time, to a cold and shaded 
situation, and subsequently replacing them in 
the stove, I do not doubt the practicability of 
obtaining another crop from them within the 
