October 27 , 1881 . ] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 377 
ordinary stove house would be suitable to grow them in. Many per¬ 
sons object to them because of absence of leaves at the time of 
flowering, but this is an evil easily remedied by arranging them 
amidst dwarf Ferns.—S. G. 
A NEW TESTIMONIAL FOR THE EARTHWORM. 
It had been already shown conclusively by several naturalists 
that the common earthworm is a creature which really renders 
services to horticulture that quite overbalance the small amount 
of damage it is occasionally guilty of. To the illustrious Dr. 
Darwin it has offered a subject that is particularly suited for his 
patient inquiry and shrewd observation, the results of which, 
embodied in his little work upon “ Vegetable Mould and Earth¬ 
worms,” offer a final testimonial in behalf of a 
despised, or sometimes persecuted, annelid. The 
main facts, however, are new. We were aware 
that earthworms are of utility, because in the 
course of their life they consume decaying vege¬ 
table matter and convert it into humus or mould ; 
also that by Iheir burrows they help to bring 
about a wholesome drainage, preventing the sur¬ 
face becoming caked or hardened. Dr. Darwin, 
with an enthusiasm that we cannot wonder at, 
believes it is to the earthworm principally that 
the destiny has been assigned of renewing the 
face of the earth from year to year, and from 
age to age. In a single year, so he reckons, 
where the earthworms are in their average abun¬ 
dance. they deserve the credit of producing about 
ten tons of good mould upon an acre of land. 
This represents labour performed during only 
half the year, for earthworms do not generally 
busy themselves during the severe weather of 
winter ; and of the ordinary day they devote the 
larger portion to repose, night being their time 
of activity. A scorching sun of all things they 
appear to dread, and in dampness they particu¬ 
larly luxuriate. 
The earthworm, so this naturalist fancies, has its share of intelli¬ 
gence lodged somewhere, perhaps in the cerebral ganglia he has 
examined, for it constructs and lines its burrows in a very metho¬ 
dical way, shows also much judgment in the mode it adopts of 
drawing leaves into these according to their shape and size, and it 
has preferences for certain foods. They eat much, digesting what 
they swallow by the aid of a singular alkaline secretion, then eject¬ 
ing the most of it for the benefit of the soil. Everyone is aware that 
stamping upon the ground makes the worms quit their holes, but, 
nevertheless, Dr. Darwin thinks they are deaf as well as blind, they 
are alarmed through the sense of touch. The popular belief that 
associates worms with the decomposition of dead bodies has nothing 
of fact to support it, their food being purely vegetable. “They 
remove decaying leaves, facilitate the germination of seeds and the 
growth of plants, and create for us most of our wide, level, turf- 
covered expanses.”—C. 
any better done on the whole than it is at present. The task of 
superintending a number of men is very wearying and not so 
interesting as engaging in it oneself ; nevertheless, it is the woik 
which falls to gardeners in large gardens, and I think it is in that 
many gardeners fail who otherwise are quite competent. I make 
a point to show the workmen how I wish work done. I would as 
willingly take a shovel and show a young man how to stoke a 
boiler furnace, or the furnace of a flue, as I would show him how 
I require Grapes to be thinned. I have everything, to the plant¬ 
ing of Cabbages, performed according to my own instructions; 
and although this requires much interference with the work, 
which I have no doubt young men often do not like as appearing 
to them only slight and trivial, it is upon doing these trivial 
matters well that all successful gardening depends. Had your 
correspondent’s labourer been 
thoroughly drilled to the woik 
the said poundsworth of Orchids 
would have been saved.—A 
Many-handed Gardener. 
PLEIONES. 
Pleiones, or Indian Cro¬ 
cuses as they are sometimes 
termed, will very shortly assist 
in rendering the Orchid house 
gay. The three species that 
are most popular and the easiest 
to cultivate are P. Wallicbiana, 
P. lagenaria, and P. maculata. 
They will have shed their foli¬ 
age, and the flowers will have 
advanced, springing up as they 
do from the centre of the young 
growths. Pleiones are generally 
grown in shallow pans, and it 
is surprising how pretty those 
pans can be made to look with 
the assistance of a few seed¬ 
ling Ferns. I have practised 
this method for some seasons. 
RESPONSIBILITY OF GARDENERS. 
Your correspondent “ Single-handed ” is quite correct in stating, 
on page 341, that plants are easier to cultivate when planted out than 
when grown in pots, but it does not follow that the reason he gives 
for plants in pots in a large garden mentioned not being so healthy 
as those planted out is the correct one. It would be quite as sensible 
a proposition to state that because the pot plants in many small 
gardens are not well grown, nor the gardening generally high class, 
that there is too much to do for one pair of hands ; and that, there¬ 
fore, the gardener who has a large place to superintend with a suffi¬ 
cient number of hands to carry out his orders can do the work 
in higher style. Some of the very best gardening is to be found 
in large gardens, the very worst in small ones. Selecting isolated 
instances is a loose manner of discussing a question. If it is 
granted, then, that the highest class gardening is to be found in 
large establishments, and that the average is higher in these than 
in small places, there is a reason different from that your corre¬ 
spondent finds. A gardener in a small place who passes every¬ 
thing through his own hands, if attentive to his work, must of 
necessity grow plants well. A gardener in a large place, as 
attentive to his work as the man in a small one, will be quite 
as successful and have much more to show for the labour he 
expends. 
Personally I should find it much easier to do everything myself 
were I able to overtake the work than entrust it to subordinates, 
as I am obliged to do ; but I do not imagine the work would be 
Fig. 61.—Rondeletia anomala. (See page 374.) 
When the foliage has fallen from the pseudo-bulbs I collect 
some small seedling Ferns, such as Adiantum cuneatum and 
Pteris serrulata, and prick them in amongst the Pleiones, and 
in a few days the Ferns look quite fresh, provided they have 
been taken up carefully. After the Pleiones have flowered the 
Ferns can be removed. * These small Ferns answer two purposes— 
first they conceal the material in which the Pleiones are grown, 
and secondly they show the flowers off to greater advantage. 
P. Wallichiana is the first of the three to flower; the flowers of 
this species are very pretty, but only second-rate compared with 
the two latter. The flowers are extremely useful in bouquet¬ 
making, and anyone that has visited the central avenue in Covcnt 
Garden about this time of the year could not fail to admire the 
way in which the charming little flowers are employed in making 
elegantly arranged bouquets. Like many other plants as well as 
