454 JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. [ November 17, 1881. 
which, if my recollection serves me right, is just about half or a 
little more than half the quantity of piping which I saw in a high- 
temperature cultivator’s vinery in the Lothians once that was 
either only 20 or 24 feet wide, and contained twelve rows or more 
pipes. This means a considerable difference in the expense to 
begin with. True, the difference in the mean temperatures of the 
spring months is some 2° in favour of Longleat over the Lothians, 
but cold nights are nearly equal according to the occasional 
accounts in your pages of both places, while the west coast re¬ 
joices in a preponderance of dull skies and rain, which must 
equalise matters to some extent.— Correspondent. 
[The photograph affords a fair idea of the interior of the Long¬ 
leat vinery, but by no means does justice to the appearance of 
the crop. A house of Grapes so large cannot be successfully 
photographed.—E d.] 
GETTING ON. 
Some time since I read an article by your much-esteemed 
correspondent, Mr. Pettigrew, on “Lessons of Life for Young 
Gardeners ” that interested me much and amused me also. I 
believe your correspondent was prompted by the best of motives, 
and believed all he himself stated; but he will excuse me, I hope, 
in saying that his opinions are not shared by a great many gar¬ 
deners of experience. Shortly, Mr. Pettigrew’s theory, as regards 
success in life among gardeners, is simply that the best men are 
all but sure to come to the front. I am not going to deny that 
the good men sometimes reap the reward of their industry and 
good behaviour, but I do not for a moment believe that the rule 
holds good in gardening. If it does, then my experience is 
different from other people’s. By good places I simply mean the 
most respectable and the best paid, and I suppose this is what 
Mr. Pettigrew means too. Now I know a very large number of 
gardeners in both large and small situations, well paid and ill 
paid, and I can conscientiously say that I would grievously 
wrong the last—the men who have not got on—if I was to say 
they were in any respect, or on the average, inferior to the first. 
Many of the best men I know are men in small places, not a few 
of them single-handed, and they have been trying energetically 
all their lives to get further up the ladder, but without success, 
and chiefly because they lack influence. It can hardly be ex¬ 
pected to be otherwise : there is no competitive examination 
among gardeners for situations, and success is largely a question 
of luck or influence. It is a great mistake to suppose that all the 
best places are tilled by the best men, but such ought to be the 
case if, as Mr. Pettigrew says, the best men are sure to come to 
the front. Is even a fair proportion of them there ? If it was so, 
would there be so many changes, so many dismissals for incom¬ 
petency ? Would there be so many ill-managed gardens where 
everything is found to render management successful but skill 
and energy 1 I think not. I should think, sir, that your expe¬ 
rience as a horticultural editor has made you aware of this long 
ago—made you aware not only that the best men do not always 
get the promotion they deserve, but that they often also fail to 
meet with that appreciative encouragement they should expect. 
When I recall to my mind the circumstances under which many 
men have obtained excellent situations I am driven to one con¬ 
clusion only—that success is largely a matter of chance, both in 
public and private gardens. The fact is indeed notorious. 
I am not speaking as a disappointed man, for few have less 
reason to complain than I have, I am glad to say ; but I simply 
give you my opinion, gained from experience and acquaintance 
with a large number of gardeners in high places and low ones as 
well, and not a little acquaintance with employers. I cannot here 
specify cases, but I could do, and they would startle your readers 
a little. This, however, I may be permitted to state, that out of a 
large number of first-rate situations I have known filled during 
the past thirty years, I could point to very few of them in which 
the success of the chosen man was due to his own special qualifi¬ 
cations as a man or a gardener. Some of them have turned out 
bad and some well, and several of whom the best things were 
expected have turned out best, and are now well-known men and 
gardeners. In numbers of instances the thing was managed by 
“ a friend in court,” and but for whom the applicant would have 
had no chance whatever. Let not your young readers be dis¬ 
couraged, however, by these remarks. It is their chances of the 
first step—securing a good situation—that I regard as most pre¬ 
carious and most doubtful, but it is the most important step of 
all. Once in a place, however, it requires ability and a know¬ 
ledge of one’s business, as well as all the good qualities pointed 
\ ou t hy Mr. Pettigrew, to keep it, and for this reason alone young 
men ought to strive to fit themselves for their duties in the best 
manner possible. 
Another thing. If head gardeners would do their duty them¬ 
selves by promoting their men according to merit, that would in 
itself greatly facilitate the progress and success of the most de¬ 
serving, because the weeding-out process would begin at the 
beginning, and fewer inferior men would be left. But gardeners, 
as is well known, do not follow this wholesome rule. 
In conclusion, I may say that I am aware it is the custom of 
most writers to expatiate on brighter prospects of the most de¬ 
serving and clever men ; and in business capacities, where men 
are their own masters and control their own affairs, this view is 
no doubt the right one; but it is different in the fight for 
situations in gardening. I believe there is little or no foun¬ 
dation for much that is written in the couleur dc Rose vein. When 
a good man obtains a good place the chances are that he will 
shine ; but the stars are few, and who will venture to assert that 
the brightest orbs in the horticultural firmament are the men who 
fill the best places 1— Dunedin. 
EUPHORBIA JACQUINLEFLORA. 
Having profited by many useful hints in the Journal, I have 
thought that perhaps my experience as to the propagation of the 
above plant may be useful to some of the readers of its pages. We 
had a large specimen planted out against the back wall of a stove, 
but through some cause in the spring of this year its leaves com¬ 
menced turning yellow and falling, which convinced me at once 
that all was not well with it, and as it was a particular favourite 
with my employers I wished to find, if possible, the cause of its 
unhealthy condition. On removing a little soil from the collar I 
found that the bark was quite decayed. Probably the cause of 
this was being planted too deeply, the ball of the plant being 
fully 4 inches below the level of the soil. As there was not the 
least chance of its recovering I determined to try an experiment 
with the branches. The plant was lifted and divided, not using 
the knife, into a number of pieces, each piece with a heel. Some 
of the growths thus secured were over 5 feet in length and as 
thick as a man’s finger. I then made a small trench the whole 
length of the wall, which was filled with leaf soil and sand ; the 
branches were placed in about 6 inches apart, giving a watering 
to settle the soil, then secured to the wire against the wall. 
This operation was done in March. In due time they commenced 
growing, only three out of about thirty dying. The wall, which is 
8 feet in height, is now well covered with luxuriant growth®, some 
of which have attained the length of 5 feet and are showing 
their flower buds. 
The above way of propagating this old and most useful winter¬ 
flowering plant may not be new to all who read the Journal, but 
it may be to some, and in the hope that it may prove useful I 
submit it.—J. Richardson, Calverton Hall, Notts. 
THE CUCUMBER-ROOT DISEASE—ANTS. 
“ W. J.” writes, on page 379, inquiring about this disease. I 
have been troubled just in the same way as your correspondent, 
but did not know the real cause of the plants failing until I saw 
the illustration and examined the roots of my plants. I imagined 
that they had used up all the plant food in the soil and were 
starving, consequently I gave the beds a coating of cow dung an 
inch thick, watering heavily for two or three days. The effect 
has been very satisfactory. Of course, all the young fruits which 
were injured were cut away, as they would never have been 
marketable. Whether this cure would suit the Melons I do not 
know, as I have no faith in growing them in a Cucumber house. 
I have been pestered with ants and tried all sorts of cures—■ 
arsenic and treacle, guano, paraffin, but all to no purpose. I 
lately, however, noticed that they were very fond of Apple. 
I have since fed them liberally on it. I lay the pieces on top of 
the wall alongside the pathway. Every half hour I go along the 
house with a can of boiling water, and, dropping the pieces in, 
kill from twelve to twenty ants on each piece, setting the baits 
again for further execution. I have not seen this method recom¬ 
mended before, and can say that it is both cleaner and less 
dangerous than others which I have tried.— HORTUS. 
Seedling Verbenas. — It may possibly be of service to some 
readers if I state my success with seedling Verbenas last summer, 
and how the plants were raised. The seed was sown in moderate 
heat the last week in February, and the plants when ready were 
pricked off in small pots in a mixture of loam, decayed cow dung and 
leaf soil, with a fair amount of silver sand, and were gradually 
hardened in cold pits. Some were potted for conservatory decora¬ 
tion ; they proved most useful, and several produced first-class 
flowers. Plants of the best varieties are now in a cold frame; they 
