August 14, 1884. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
151 
looking for the visitors that did not come and the rain that did ; and all 
this with their faces gradually getting longer and longer and whiter and 
whiter, until you would have thought that they would have been glad to 
sink into the earth out of sight, which, I understand, was just their 
feeling. 
Thursday the 10th was a little better, but the evening, when the Not¬ 
tingham people would have flocked in in large numbers, was wet. There 
was not £30 taken in the two days, and £150 to £200 was wanted to pay 
prizes and expenses. A council of ways and means was called by the 
officers, the Mayor (the President of the year), a few gentlemen friends of 
the Society, and the exhibitors ; and on the representations of the Secre¬ 
taries as to the state of things it was decided that, subject to the kind 
permission of Alderman Lambert, the owner of Mapperley Park, to grant 
the use of the park for the two following days of the week, the Show 
should be continued open at popular prices up to Saturday evening, and 
the majority of the exhibitors very willingly agreed. Some of them who 
came a long distance could not do so, but they removed what they had as 
quietly as possible, and the places emptied were filled by Nottingham 
gentlemen sending from their gardens sufficient stuff to keep a good show 
up to the Saturday evening. But even with these two added days the 
loss the Society suffers is heavy and crushing. 
The Hon. Secretaries have published a circular setting forth the con¬ 
dition of things, which, if you could find room for, would possibly be a 
means of bringing their case into the notice of some who could help 
substantially. I enclose a copy. 
“ We beg respectfully to call your attention to your subscription to the above 
Society which still remains unpaid. 
“ The deplorable failure through bad weather of the recent Exhibition in Mapperley 
Park compel the Committee to apply for all outstanding subscriptions, and at the same 
time ask you if possible to increase it. Some idea of the Society’s financial position 
may be drawn from the fact that while the expenses of the Show, including prize 
money, amounted to £300, the total receipts at the gates were only £68. Trusting this 
appeal will meet with a hearty response, 
“ We remain, 
“ Tours faithfully, 
“ James Don, 20, Chapel Bar, \ „ „ „ 
“ E. StEW.\.RD, 2, Exchange Row, j 
. The Show itself was a splendid one, infinitely superior to the one of last 
year, and that was considered by good judges to be as good a show as 
could be seen in the provinces. The groups of plants set up for effect 
were the admiration of everybody. These are the only things that I shall 
specially mention; it is too late in the day now to particularise. Let us 
hope that the Society may have better luck next year if they “ go in ” for 
a show, though shows are not what the Society was established for—the 
idea of the promoters being more educational than exhibitional—show’s, 
especially large shows, being an outgrowth or excrescence which some of 
the members deplore. 
My second note is the Notts fruit crop. Well, the Notts fruit crop is 
nowhere this summer. Orchards are blank, or next to it. Apples very 
few, and those of the constant bearers, such as Keswick Codlins, Duchess 
of Oldenburgs, or Russian and Greenings. Pears scarcely any, and those 
of the common varieties. Plums none. Damsons none. No Walnuts, 
a fair crop of Cobnuts, but not many Filberts. Plenty of Straw'berries, 
though they all ripened at once, nearly. Pretty fair of Raspheri’ies, an 
abundance of Gooseberries (with us, we lie high ; in the valleys not so 
many). The same of Currants, Black, White, and Red. Apricots a good 
crop. Peaches a few. All these keep up our supplies of preserves, but 
they do not make up lo us the loss of the Apple crop. No other fruit can 
make that up to us ; and though we can buy in the market cases of foreign 
Apples fairly cheap, they do not make up to us the loss of our own supply. 
A gardener can face a cook with a bolder spirit when he has a good Apple 
crop than he can when his supply is small. At least that is my experi¬ 
ence, and I am getting an old hand now. It is, however, time that I 
wrote the usual—H., Notts. 
TEEES AT THE CAPE. 
(Continued from page 130.') 
EUCALYPTUS. 
Amongst the introduced timber trees of Cape Colonj'-, after the 
European Pines and Oak, it will be proper to speak of the Blue Gum 
of Australia (Eucalyptus globulus). The Blue Gum is more widely 
planted in South Africa than any other tree, but it rarely shows self- 
grown seedlings, and consequently has not the forestal value of the 
bak and the Pines. I shall not easily forget my introduction to the 
Blue Gum, in its own hemisphere and latitude. It was my first 
morning on shore near Cape Town. People with their English 
habits were in bed or at breakfast, and I had the fresh morning air 
to myself. There was a lightness and freshness about this air 
wonderfully recalling the Nilgiris, and this illusion was complete 
when I passed out of the perfumed Pine woods to where some giant 
Blue Gums stretched their limbs across the road, and filled the air 
wiih their strong wholesome scent. All along the coast of South 
Africa, from above Cape Town to Natal, the Blue Gum grows with 
facility and rapidity—nearly the same powerful assimilator of carbon 
that it is on the Nilgiris. Ten tons has been mentioned as the acre- 
increment in Natal. Approaching the colder western coast this 
figure probably diminishes, but there are no plantations sufficiently 
large and regular on the coast to afford'any reliable figures of growth. 
In the drier climate of the interior the Blue Gum succeeds best when 
there is subsoil moisture. It is extensively planted round farms 
everywhere, and is said to have modified the mild malarial fever 
which is prevalent in some portions of the Transvaal, an elevated 
plateau (about 4000 feet elevation) which extends northwards into the 
tropics. 
On the same plateau, at the large English town of Kimberley 
(the diamond fields) where a bad form of malarial fever is prevalent 
in summer, and where firewood sells at fancy prices, Eucalypts have 
been planted just sufficiently to show that they will grow well there. 
There is now a plentiful supply of water at Kimberley from the 
Orange river, and altogether the best prospects of successful Eucalypt 
planting. The only portion of Cape Colony where the Blue Gum 
appears not to succeed is on the last range of high mountains rising 
to the plateaux of the interior. On these mountains, especially if the 
aspect is southerly, the snows and frosts of winter are too severe for 
the Blue Gum. In the semi-desert country to the north-west, where 
the rainfall ranges from 10 to 15 inches down to only a few scanty 
uncertain showers, Eucalypts can naturally not be grown without 
irrigation. The Blue Gum and other Eucalypts have been most 
extensively planted in the neighbourhood of Cape Town. In certain 
situations thej’ suffer there from wind, and the wood, as firewood, has 
a bad reputation for being twisted in the grain and difficult to 
split. Grown in close plantations these objections would probably 
disappear. 
Speaking generally, the Blue Gum appears to grow less rapidly in 
Cape Colony than on the Nilgiris, and there are other Eucalypts 
which rival, or even surpass it, in rapidity and robustness of growth. 
In appearance, the average Blue (lum on the southern seaboard of 
Africa is about equal to those I saw in Italy, both being somewhat 
inferior to the Nilgiri tree. 
With regard to the natural reproduction of the Blue Gum, coppice 
shoots are not so plentiful nor so strong as I remember them a year 
ago on the Nilgiris ; but, on the other hand, self-sown seedlings occur 
in certain situations in Cape Colony, while on the Nilgiris it is a 
notable fact that they are practically non-existent. Probably both 
the lessened power of coppicing, and the occurrence to some extent 
of self-sown seedlings, is due to the fact that the Cape climate is 
drier than that of the Nilgiris ; the Cape climate is warmer as regards 
air temperature than the Nilgiris, but as regards the sun quite extra- 
tropical, being in latitude 34° as against the 11° of the Nilgiris. 
The mean temperature of Cape Town is 61-25°, and the rainfall 
24 inches. On the cool side of the Table Mountain range, where the 
Pines, Oaks, and Blue Gums attain such fine dimensions, the rainfall 
is greater and the temperature slightly less. On the Nilgiris, where 
the Blue Gums grow best, the mean temperature is about 56°, and 
the rainfall 45 inches. It is remarkable that the best show of self- 
sown Blue Gums in Cape Colony is believed to be at a farm some 
distance from the south-west coast, where the rainfall is less than in 
Cape Town. Here, in this one locality, the young Blue Gums are 
described as coming up like grass : the situation is dry and open, and 
the soil somewhat stony. Near Cape Town, self-grown Blue (iums 
are observable, but they are not common. All over Cape Colony the 
Blue Gum produces fertile seed, and no other is used in nurseries ; 
while, on the Nilgiris, it is necessary to use Australian seed on account 
of the bad quality of indigenous seed. 
Of other Eucalypts only one I believe has been at all extensively 
planted. This was at first believed to be Eucalyptus Mahagoni, but 
was subsequently identified as Eucalyptus robusta. In iSoutkern 
India I found it to succeed at 2000 feet lower elevation than 
Eucalyptus globulus, and in Cape Colony it appears to stand drought 
better than Eucalyptus glob’ulus. Mr. Lister is very sanguine of its 
successful and easy planting. I have rarely witnessed a more rapid 
and vigorous growth than that shown by this tree in the^ tovrn 
avenues and in the Government plantation at Worcester. It is now 
being tried in the east of the Colony. Its compact form, and (for a 
Gum tree) dense foliage, render it fit for avenue planting. 
Of other Eucalypt^s, a great variety has been planted, by twos 
and threes, in different parts of the Colony. Very many of these 
I recognise as having been more or less successfully planted in 
M^’sore. 
The valuable Yarrah has been identified by Mr. Lister, growing 
near Cape Town, and yielding good seed. The sweetly scented 
Eucalyptus citriodora, which succeeds as a garden tree in Mysore, 
grows well in Cape Colony, but was found to be sensitive to drought 
in the Botanic Gardens at Port Elizabeth on the southern coast.— 
(The Indian Forester.) 
(To be continued.) 
BISHOP AUCKLAND FLOWER SHOW. 
This old favourite northern Show has been again resuscitated after five 
years without any attempt being made to hold an exhibition. The three years 
prior to that it rained on each exhibition day continuously. At the last exhi- 
