Kovembor IS. 1884. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
431 
COMING EVENTS 
M 
18 
Th 
14 
F 
15 
s 
16 
SUN 
17 
M 
18 
TU 
19 
W 
Richmond, Brixton, Teddington, and Tunbridge Wells (two days). 
Reading. Crystal Palace, Huddersfield, Canterbury (two days). 
2Srd Sunday after Trinity. 
Winchester, Yeovil, and Lincoln. Plymouth (two days). 
Wimbledon. Northampton and Birmingham (two days). 
AN ADDRESS TO GARDENERS. 
enclosed is an extraeb from a paper read by 
Esq., President of the Caterham 
Horticaltural and Cottage Gardeners’ Society, 
on October Slst, at the opening of the session 
1884-5, of the meetings for mutual improve¬ 
ment, and which it was unanimously resolved 
should be forwarded to the Journal of Horti- 
culture .—B. Catt, &ecretari/. 
^ The occupation of the gardener seems to demand a 
variety of qualities. Patience is needed, for although 
no one would be so childlike as to scratch the earth to 
inquire if the seed is germinating, in many instances months 
must elapse before the failure or success of a given treatment 
can be atiirmed. Minute observation is also necessary, for 
it is chiefly in the observance of petty details that there lies 
the difference between success and failure. Teaching will 
accomplish much, but observation is fruitful of more. There 
are many bits of experience, amounting almost to tricks of 
trade, which are found very useful; but given these, nothing 
is a substitute for watching, testing, and reading. It is 
doubtless the innumerable and subtle chemical conditions, 
varying with every change of atmosphere, soil, and condition, 
which have produced a literature so copious and so continu¬ 
ous week by week. The gardener who is not a reader soon 
ceases to occupy the foremost place. Nothing he can read 
can be a substitute for his own brains, but his own ideas will 
narrow and crystallise unless he reads as well as thinks, and 
thinks as well as reads. These are the reasons which give 
potency to your technical discussions. 
One is sometimes surprised to hear depreciatory remarks 
of these meetings. Some phenomena must surely exist 
which induce gardeners to suggest each to the other better 
modes of treatment. The cobblers do not debate how best to 
mend boots ; the coachmen do not discuss how best to 
manage horses. Why do gardeners meet to read and hear 
papers on the best system of cultivation ? Are they more 
loquacious than their brethren ? Are they less employed 
than their compeers ? Rather is it not that the gardener has 
to deal with a more variable quantity with respect to the 
conditions under which he can operate, and hence he needs 
every possible hint which by any and every means he can 
obtain. Your discussions are in the interest of your occu¬ 
pation, and whatever tends to develope your powers benefits 
those in whose employ you are labouring. 
Now there are a few points affecting the relationship of 
employers and emplo 3 ed to which, perhaps, I may be allowed 
to advert. I can conceive a gardener who takes a deep in¬ 
terest in his work producing some magnificent bloom, and 
with commendatory pride placing the plant in a prominent 
position in the conservatory. I can fancy the young lady, 
or say the young gentleman, having their eyes attracted by 
the beautiful flowers, and forthwith without any ado abstract¬ 
ing the bloom—that very bloom which for many a day has 
been the anxious solicitude of the cultivator. I can realise 
No. 229.—VoL. IX., Third Skries. 
the blank amazement and intense disappointment with which 
the gardener on returning to the conservatory finds his iiet 
bloom murdered. If the gardener felt no chagrin, in my 
judgment he would not evince the zeal which, in this ima¬ 
ginary case, I have assumed him to possess. If the gardener 
speak out the feelings with which he is filled, the employer 
can strictly say the flower was his; that with his appliances, 
with his labour, and with his money, the bloom was produced. 
Now this is just one of the many cases in which mutual for¬ 
bearance is so necessary. Justice without sentiment is 
shown by the employer ; affection without vested right per¬ 
tains to the employed; but how often has such an episode 
disturbed, if it has not destroyed, the existent relationship ? 
Take another case. A gardener raises plants from seeds. 
If he be in an ordinary gentleman’s private garden the 
number of the one kind of production is in excess of the 
requirements. What more useful than that the surplus 
should be handed to another producer, who, in response, is 
supposed to supply out of what he may have in too great 
abundance ? Thus both are served. “ Exchange is no 
robbery,” as we used to say at school. Within the limits 
thus sketched, good, and only good, arises. But do matters 
always rest there ? From these harmless exchanges in kind 
do not there sometimes follow exchanges for money, and if 
not sales to other gardeners sales to shopkeepers ? and if 
such sales, whose is the money ? Is it the gardener’s “ per¬ 
quisites ” or the master’s own ? What I have sketched has 
occurred and does arise. In these and kindred matters the 
best solution lies in the consideration of both parties. The 
master might recognise the servant’s zeal by a bonus, the 
servant might protect the master’s interest with added per¬ 
spicuity in remembrance of the appreciation thus tangibly 
shown. 
I will cite one further instance. A head gardener enters 
on a new engagement, and brings with him (the employer 
knows not whence) a number of plants. These are inter¬ 
spersed with those already on the premises. The employer 
perhaps notes a change, but no special remark is made. 
At the end, say, of twelve months master and servant agree 
to part. Assuming the plants are now removed a gap is 
noted. If the gardener asks the employer to pay their 
value there is, not unnaturally, an unpleasant sensation. 
Were, however, the plants pointed out at the commencement 
the master can either refuse to accept them or offer to pay 
for them; but when they have formed a portion of the com¬ 
mon stock—a stock cultivated at the expense of the master 
—either removal or monetary claim is alike a delicate pro¬ 
posal, however just the initiatory claim may have been. 
Imaginary, did you say ? On the contrary, such incidents 
have occurred, and just for want of a manly understanding at 
the start. The finish has been painful. 
I am desirous of directing your attention to another in¬ 
quiry—viz., whether sufficient opportunities exist for young 
men to make themselves fairly reliable all-round gardeners. 
The specialist has a chance. He may enter a small nursery ; 
he may take a given branch ; from the small he may advance 
to the larger nurseries ; he may choose bulbs or seeds, 
flowers or fruit, plants or trees ; he may adopt the useful or 
choose the ornamental; he may confine himself to the con¬ 
servatory, or branch into landscape gardening. These are 
his possibilities. But where is the school or training-ground 
wherein an all-round man is to be trained ? Some maintain 
that a gardener is like a poet—born and not made. Within 
limits there is truth in this statement. It is sometimes 
pitiable to see a mother demanding her daughter to practise 
at the piano when the child has no more music in her than 
an old brass kettle; but a good tutor will make a musical 
child a yet more accomplished musician. So the advantages 
of training even to one who has innate love for gardening 
cannot be over-estimated. Some men can make flowers 
grow, as it were, by simply looking at the pots. But these 
are the exceptions. What is to become of the man with 
No. 1885.—VOL. LXXL, Old Series. 
